The eleventh “People Who Read People” episode is an interview with Benjamin Moots, who spent 15 years in prison, mostly in maximum security settings, for second-degree murder. Ben is on Twitter at @realfishydonk.
Links to the episode:
Topics discussed include:
An interview with Brandi Fink, a psychology researcher and an assistant professor at UNM Dept. of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. Brandi has done a lot of work analyzing the behavior of couples and families experiencing problems, including issues of physical abuse, emotional distress, and drug/alcohol abuse. She once worked with the famous relationship researcher and therapist John Gottman. Brandi and I talk about behavioral indicators of healthy and unhealthy relationships.
A transcript is below.
Links to the episode:
Topics discussed include:
Here are some resources and articles and studies related to some of the stuff we discussed:
TRANSCRIPT
[Note: transcripts will contain errors.]
Zach: Hello and welcome to the People Who Read People Podcast. I’m Zach Elwood. Today is June 1st, 2019. Today I’ll be talking to Dr. Brandi Fink and a little bit about our guest. Dr. Fink has a PhD in psychology. Uh, she’s a psychology researcher. She currently works at the University of New Mexico in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences.
And the reason I wanted to talk to Dr. Fink was because she spent a lot of time studying human behavior, and I’ll run through some of the specific work she’s been involved in. She’s done research into analyzing behaviors of couples and families, especially couples and families having problems and dealing with physical abuse or drug and alcohol abuse.
She’s also done studies involving brain scans showing how certain brain activity can be related to anger and a greater, greater likelihood of violence. Also, she and a team developed something called the Simpler Video Coder, SVC, which is a piece of software that helps psychological [00:01:00] researchers more easily log the behaviors they see.
When they’re reviewing videotaped sessions or interactions. So, hi Dr. Fink. Thanks a lot for coming on.
Brandi: Yeah, thank you for having me. I’m really excited to chat with you today.
Zach: Yeah. Really, really honored to have you on. You’ve done so much interesting work. So many interesting studies and papers online that I was reviewing, and so it’s kind of hard to summarize your, uh, career in a brief, in a brief way.
Was that a pretty decent summary of your, of your work?
Brandi: Yep, yep. That’s a pretty decent summary.
Zach: Okay, great. So, uh, let’s start out talking about some of the types of behavior analysis that you’ve, you’ve worked on. What, what is the goal with that analysis? Is it just for, you know, psychological studies or there other applications?
If you could summarize some of that work.
Brandi: Yeah. Well I am interested in, um, I. Especially couple functioning because I’m really interested in kid outcomes and child outcomes, [00:02:00] and because the couples control the environment that kids live in, that seemed to be, to me, the most logical place to study and to do interventions.
And so, um. I’ve been, I was really fortunate as an undergraduate, um, to work in John Gottman’s lab and that really fostered, um, this interest, especially the interest in how people interact. And that’s really where, um, I got my good scientific foundation in watching human behavior. I’ve been a human behavior watcher since I was a wee wee child.
Um, you know, and there’s nothing more interesting to me on the face of the planet than, um, watching humans behave
Zach: so. That’s great. Uh, I was gonna jump in and say I didn’t even know you studied with, uh, Dr. John Gottman, who is known as the [00:03:00] father of science-based couples therapy. Is that an accurate description of him?
Yes,
Brandi: yes. Yeah, so it was really phenomenal work and I happened to be working in his lab right at the time that they were publishing all of their research about the interpersonal behaviors between couples that predicted divorce and declines in relationship satisfaction. Yeah. So that’s, I got my training in, um, coding, couple behaviors straight.
Straight from the master himself.
Zach: Wow. So he’s known for his, him and his teams were known for creating a specific coding system for coding the behaviors and verbal statements of, of couples. Is that right?
Brandi: That’s correct. It’s called the specific affect coding system and it codes, um, negative behaviors and positive behaviors are kind of classified into two categories and then neutral behavior.
And of the [00:04:00] negative behaviors that they code, which is like the worst is contempt and then belligerence, criticism, defensiveness and stonewalling. But it’ll also code for domineering behavior, pure anger, um, sadness. And things like that. But the five codes, they call them the five horsemen of the apocalypse, which are contempt, um, belligerence, criticism, defensiveness, and, um, stonewalling.
Those prevent or predict, sorry, uh, declines in relationship satisfaction and divorce within seven years with about 80% accuracy. So
Zach: it’s pretty
Brandi: incredible.
Zach: Okay. So we’ll talk more about the specifics of some of that, uh, okay. The behaviors later. But, uh, for now, I was wondering, I, I wasn’t clear if it, if this kind of work was done just for, um, psychological research settings or is some [00:05:00] of it done for like therapeutic settings or is it both?
Brandi: Yeah, it’s really kind of both. And I use it in both my research and my clinical work with couples. Um, because these behaviors are so strongly predictive of declines in the relationship quality, that it’s really important to intervene. You know, with couples, so in couples therapy, you know, I have a workbook and I list out here are these behaviors, here’s what, here’s all the different forms of contempt and all the different forms of criticism.
And, um, what we wanna really do is minimize the expression of those and emphasize the expression of more positive interpersonal behaviors.
Zach: Mm-hmm. So when we talk about, when you talk about getting those indicators of, of different, uh, emotions, what are some specific examples of, you know. [00:06:00] The things you’re noticing and then logging as those, you know, examples of the emotions or anger or whatever.
Brandi: Okay. So contempt is the worst of the worst behaviors, and that can be what it communicates to the partner is that I have an utter lack of respect for you. And it can take the form of nonverbal behavior, like eye-rolling or unilaterally or bilaterally pulling back the corners of one’s mouth. And so, and then it can also take the form of name calling like you’re such a son of a bitch.
You know, or you jackass. Mm-hmm. Um, and, and things like that. So that’s just the worst of the worst. Also, sarcasm. Mm-hmm. A lot of people think they’re being funny when they’re being sarcastic and rolling their eyes at their partner, but they’re absolutely cutting that relationship off at its knees. [00:07:00] Um, so those are really important behaviors to, you know, help folks recognize and, and stop exhibiting.
Zach: Besides contempt, uh, indicators, what, what are, what’s another important category?
Brandi: So, another important category is belligerence. And this belligerence is done to intentionally kind of provoke someone. Um, and it kind of takes some different forms. Like one that just makes my blood run cold is called interpersonal.
Terrorism or the interpersonal dare. So let’s say a couple, they go to a party and they leave the party and the husband or male partner says to the female partner, Hey, you know, it looks like you were flirting with that guy in there. And she’ll kind of cock her chin forward and say, well, what if I was?
Mm-hmm. You know, it’s like, what do you do in that instance? And so it’s really kind of pushing the boundaries, um, of the relationship. And [00:08:00] then sometimes people think that they’re kind of poking fun and playing with their partner. Um, but it’s still considered belligerence. And so it’s called unreciprocated humor.
So let’s say someone says, don’t I hate that name when you call me bsy. Will you please quit calling me bsy? And the husband says, but Bsy, it’s so fun. I love calling you Bsy Bsy bsy bsy. Mm-hmm. Um, you know, so one partner thinks they’re kind of joking around, but it absolutely falls flat.
Zach: Right? Yeah. I mean, I, I can, I’m sure I, I, I can definitely relate to that.
And I’m sure many people can like to a, to a certain degree where it’s like, you think you’re, you think you’re being funny, sarcastic, but the other person is just not on the same, same wavelength as you, and they don’t appreciate that at all. Yeah,
Brandi: yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. And the humor is a little more cutting.
It’s not like good natured teasing that we. We see when both couples will, right. Both partners will just kind of, you know, you see a relaxed laughter [00:09:00] in their bodies, um mm-hmm. And things like that. And you, it’s more
Zach: mean, mean-spirited. Yeah. More mean spirited goes too far. Yeah. Yeah.
Brandi: And I see it a lot between siblings, um, you know, siblings who, and young kids who wanna pester their, their, you know, brother or sister too.
Zach: Mm-hmm. So are there, uh, are there any strong correlations with certain behaviors or patterns that would really surprise people? How strongly they’re linked to, you know, for example, um, you know, a couple that’s gonna break up or, you know, indicators of abuse or things like that? Or, or is it more just a, a quantity amount of, of these kinds of indicators?
Brandi: Yeah, it’s, it’s kind of both. Um, we definitely see, you know, and I think it’s always surprises everyone whenever I talk to them. That eye rolling is such a disastrous behavior to exhibit to your partner [00:10:00] because it’s like all over our comedy shows. I was teaching family psychology when I was in graduate school, and so I had a big session on this interpersonal behavior and everybody loves Raymond was the popular sitcom at the time.
And those two partners, Raymond and his wife, just rolled their eyes at each other all the time. And I’m like, people don’t model that. Don’t imitate that. Yes, it’s terrible. It’s terrible. And then I think the other real deadly behavior is criticism. Um, so making you know global statements about your partner’s behavior.
Like you always, I. Leave your crap all over the floor. What that implies is that person really has a probably, yeah. Has a character deficit rather than You’re dissatisfied. Dissatisfied with some behavior the partner has exhibited.
Zach: Yeah. It’s kind of giving, it’s kind of giving [00:11:00] insight into the, how they view the partner in their mind.
It is always, or yes, near always in their mind. And, but they, is it kinda like you have to use, uh, like kind of cognitive therapy to tell them like, it’s not always
Brandi: right.
Zach: It’s, you know.
Brandi: Yep. And getting them to practice, um, you know, lodging a complaint. A complaint is a perfectly justifiable behavior in a relationship and necessary to, you know, correct things that are annoying or, you know, bring something that is bothersome to the attention of the partner.
And so a complaint is like. I really hate it when you leave your dirty clothes on the floor of the closet. That’s a complaint. And that is perfectly legitimate. But a criticism would be you are always leaving your crap all over the closet floor. You know? So it’s, it’s the always statements, the never statements.
You [00:12:00] never, and you should, those are like the deadly triad
Zach: of, and so these would be things that you logged when you’re watching a video, you would log the use of that language specifically?
Brandi: Absolutely. Yep. Mm-hmm. Yep. So in our lab, in the studies that I’m doing, um, with partner violence, I am wanting to look at the whole body’s response to, um.
So I’m recording brain activity, cardiac activity, how much the skin sweats, how much their pupils dilate when they see their partner saying these. Um, destructive things to them. Mm-hmm.
Zach: Get it. We’ll, we’ll get back to that because that’s Okay. Some interesting stuff. But, uh, I had a quick, uh, question about the, everybody loves Raymond.
Uh, yes. Story. Do you, do you think it’s possible, considering, obviously lot people watch a lot of tv, is it possible that people would model the behavior they see in television [00:13:00] characters and then that could have a, a negative impact on the relationship?
Brandi: Yeah, and we. You know, we definitely see also that it’s learned behavior, so it comes from their families of origin.
Maybe this is how the family members talk to each other when they were, um, growing up. And then yes, seeing this on TV programs where everybody’s laughing, you know? And so when you’re at a party with your partner and you wanna be the funny person, oh, I’m gonna roll my eyes because this gets big laughs.
But it’s really. Destructive to your relationship?
Zach: Yeah, and I can definitely, I, I can honestly, I can relate to that too because sometimes, you know, um, when my, my wife and I are having a, an argument or something, I’ll, you know, I’ll, I guess I will sometimes roll my eyes slightly. Like I just am kind of looking up and she’s like, you’re rolling your eyes at me.
And I’m like, I wasn’t, I didn’t think I was doing that. But yeah, you, I can see how that would be, you know, very, very aggravating if you got that, you know, if that, if that was the perception that I just was like, ’cause you’re [00:14:00] basically rolling your eyes implies like, oh, this is such a stupid conversation or whatever, you know?
Yes.
Brandi: And you are such a stupid person,
Zach: right. The, the implication. Yeah.
Brandi: Right. Yeah.
Zach: And so I definitely, it, it’s definitely something I’ve keyed into because she’s called my attention to it. So I am aware that that’s a, uh, a bad pattern.
Brandi: Yeah. Good for her. Good for her.
Zach: Yeah. Yeah. We, we try to talk about those, those things.
Yeah.
Brandi: Yeah.
Zach: Uh.
Brandi: And I think it’s, uh, one thing I’ll just I wanna add here is, you know, we kind of, as a society are phobic about anger, but pure anger, when it’s unadulterated by these other behaviors of contempt, criticism, belligerence, defensiveness or stonewalling is actually healthy. Mm-hmm. So this is pure anger where I will say to you, I am so angry at you right now, so I’ve kind of constrained my anger, you know, and I’m giving you a direct expression of that, that mm-hmm.[00:15:00]
In the moment, nobody likes it feels incredibly uncomfortable. And both partners rate it as, you know, a very negative experience. Mm-hmm. But we can see in sequential. Analyses of just a discussion of a disagreement as well as long-term over the course of their relationship. It puts the discussion on a different track and things proceed in a much more healthy direction.
Zach: Right. So it’s It’s healthy, it’s giving, yeah. Yeah. You have to, you have to be honest about your feelings without feeling that it’s a horrible thing, a situation that you’re in. Yeah. Just accepting that it’s a normal
Brandi: Yeah, and it’s okay to be angry and it’s actually healthy to be angry. And we see when people are better at expressing this pure anger that their conflict doesn’t escalate.
Like it does with our violent couples, for example, or couples who are on the [00:16:00] path to divorce. It just, you know, it has, serves a purpose of like putting a stake in the sand and saying this is a line you will not cross and nobody does.
Zach: About the, um, the long-term goals of the, this, these kinds of behavior coding, is most coding of behavior done just for the immediate use in a specific study or paper, or is there some.
Instances where they’re logging behavior that will be used in some sort of big database in the future?
Brandi: Yeah, so with my, um, I mean, we keep all data, we, we gather for sure for future analyses and things are developed in the future that we just can’t anticipate. So all the participants in my studies have given me permission to, um, keep this data and, you know, so I’ll have that for future analyses.
Um, in the studies I’m currently. Conducting, I really am trying to get at [00:17:00] what are some mechanisms, especially of alcohol related, intimate partner violence or domestic violence. Um, most instances of partner violence happen when one or both partners have been drinking, and so I’m really trying to identify what are those mechanisms that make that relationship so enduring so that we can then develop treatments to address it.
Mm-hmm. Um, and that’s kind of what I’m doing in the next stage of my research. Right now we’ve done all this behavioral coding of these couples and we try to get them really physiologically aroused, you know, with their heart rates really high and really agitated as if they were having a conflict at home so that we can measure this, um.
Behavior and then develop interventions that target that.
Zach: Yeah. Speaking of the, your work on the impact of alcohol and on abusive relationships, I’m gonna read this quote from a [00:18:00] 2018 article about some work you did. I’m just gonna read a couple paragraphs. Okay. Through lab experiments with real couples and real distress and prone to violence, Fink and her team work to figure out when to intervene.
The couples are encouraged to argue, even raise their voice, and all of it is caught on camera. We want to experiment or mimic as closely as we can in a laboratory setting what conflict is like for a couple when they’re at home. Fink said New Mexico is a good place to find solutions. One in three new Mexican women has experienced it.
And the FBI ranked our state in the top 10 for men killing women. That was another quote from, from you. Uh, so. I was wondering, is it hard to work with people you know, have been physically or mentally abusive? Can it be difficult to remain objective and detached when you’re, when you’re working with them?
Brandi: Well, it, no, not really. Um, because I want to help people. Mm-hmm. Um, [00:19:00] in this situation. I think this goes back to, um, you know, being a good human observer and a good trained psychologist. You know, I take my own personal values out of it and it’s like, I, I want the raw data. I wanna see what’s really going on here without any value or judgment placed upon it so that I can actually do something that actually helps these people in a way that will be meaningful with them.
So, um, I. Yeah. People ask me that and I must sound a little bit like a psychopath or something, but, um, but yeah, no, it just, you know, I just see that these are folks who need help. Um, and I think a lot of people who participate in couples therapy are doing it and they report it too, that they really want to try and help themselves and help, um, other people in that situation.
Zach: Yeah. It ma it makes sense [00:20:00] because, I mean, it’s like a lot of problems where you can’t, in order to make an actual change, you have to, you can’t get too emotionally invested in specific cases.
Brandi: Yep.
Zach: Instances you have to try to solve the problem objectively, and that requires some, some distancing from Yeah.
Specific cases. Yeah.
Brandi: Yeah. And I think empathy, you know, I understand that these things and these patterns of behavior that these couples are exhibiting, are learned. They’re doing it because they learned that was the way to behave in the world, and not because they’re bad people or deficient. And, um, and because it’s learned behavior, then they can learn to do other behavior as well.
That’s, um, you know, more healthy for their relationships.
Zach: Assuming you pay participants. Yeah. Is there ever a concern that, um, people are faking their kind of stories and background to get in the study? And is there anything you guys do to, you know, eliminate that, that risk?
Brandi: Um, I think the only [00:21:00] thing we’ve had couples fake to get into the study.
We pay them $20 an hour to participate in the study. We wanted them to be in committed relationships, so we wanted them to be like living together for at least six months or married. And I think the only thing that anybody’s tried to fake is actually how long they’ve been together. Um, but they were, you know, exhibiting, they.
You know, had all the typical, uh, markers of a distressed relationship, and so they were kind of motivated to participate because of that.
Zach: Yeah. That would seem like something that would be pretty hard to, uh, if somebody was looking to, uh, you know, get some easy money, that that wouldn’t be the, uh, top of the list of, you know, having to fake a, uh, a distressed relationship for a long period of time.
Yes,
Brandi: yes. And you can see, you know, we, um, we use an interview that really tries to get [00:22:00] folks in the moment of their. Topics of disagreement for them. Um, it’s called the couple’s problem inventory. And so that takes the top 10 areas of disagreement for couples, which are like money and communication and sex and substance use in-laws, child rearing and things like that.
And then they rate it on a scale from zero to a hundred. With 100 being, you know, this is a really severe area of disagreement for us, and that we have some areas where they can write in things that might be unique to them, like. Distribution of household chores, that’s always a super hot topic. If we’re having trouble getting somebody to really get invested in something, we’re like, so do you ever feel like you do more housework than your partner?
Zach: Right, right. It’ll open up some, some, some, uh, avenues there. Yes. Yeah.
Brandi: Yeah. So, you know, we get a [00:23:00] real, as realistic, um, of a example of conflict for them, and I kind of characterize it as we’re doing this interview to get them invested in their conflict as being kind of anti therapists. So a therapist always wants to kind of reframe and deescalate conflict with this.
You know, let’s say wife says she’s gets upset because her husband just goes out for a beer with friends after work without telling her. And so I would say in that instance, in the couple’s problem interview. Um, so you feel he doesn’t care about you, and she’ll be like, yes, that’s exactly it. So that’s, that’s totally anti therapist, um, type behavior.
So we really, you know, try to get them engaged in it.
Zach: Right. Ramp it up a notch.
Brandi: Yep. And then I turn to the male partner and say, well, what do you, what do you think when you hear that she thinks you don’t care about her? You know, so [00:24:00] kind of, or that she thinks that you are thoughtless? Um. So we really try to get them engaged in that and we do, we do it pretty successfully.
Zach: You mentioned the Dr. Gottman’s approach, the staff Yes. Approach for coding behaviors, but there are many other, uh, behavior coding systems for couples and family dynamics, right?
Brandi: Yes.
Zach: Uh, could you talk a little bit about the different kinds out there and like what types of, you know, interpersonal relationships they’re used for?
Brandi: Yeah, I, let’s see, I’m trying to remember. There’s the misc, um, which is marital interaction. I. I’m forgetting what the s is.
Zach: It can just be a broad categorization of the types. Okay. Like the, the categories and Yeah, you don’t, yeah, we don’t have to go into the acronyms. Yeah.
Brandi: Okay. Okay. Yeah. Um, and what they’re really trying to code for in these other coding systems are kind of positive and negative behaviors in couples, and they do a [00:25:00] pretty good job, but they aren’t as fine-grained as the specific affect coating system.
And so they’re not quite as predictive as the staff, which mm-hmm. You know, codes, you know, we’re looking at muscles around the eyes and how the eyes. We’ll clench together when someone’s angry and, and things like that. So that’s a really much more fine-grained, um, coding system. And actually when I was learning the staff, um, Dr.
Gottman had us all learn Paul Ekman’s facial action coding system first so that we knew what all muscles of the face were used in and the neck in, um, the displays of different behaviors. So yeah, the staff is just much, much more specific.
Zach: Mm-hmm. Is Dr. Gottman deceased?
Brandi: No. He has, um, the [00:26:00] Gottman Institute in, uh, the Seattle area, and they, he and his wife still do lots of couples therapy training for therapists, um, around the country.
And so therapists can go and get trained in their. Therapy type, and it’s, it’s really a fantastic therapy for couples.
Zach: Uh, so speaking of the, the staff, this would be a good part for this, uh, because there’s a, the fundamental conflict when you create these kind of, um, coding strategies, you know, that you can go really micro level mm-hmm.
Versus macro level. Like the micro level would be, you know, uh, like you had mentioned, logging a, a lot of tiny gestures and movements in specific words. Right. While a macro level, uh, approach would be logging more high level, uh, uh, aggregated behavior, big picture stuff like logging, hostility, you know?
Right. As opposed to logging, you know, an eye roll or whatever. Right. Uh, so I wanted to, this was an interesting quote I thought from, um. From Dr. [00:27:00] Gottman when he first published the staff manual, I think it was 1985. Mm-hmm. This was a quote from him. I did not want my summary codes to read something like husband shows zygomatic major contracts on face with contraction of the cheek razor muscle with shift downward in fundamental frequency, decrease in amplitude and voice in a major key and rapid inhalation and exhalation of breath with hut hut vocalizations
Brandi: instead.
Zach: I wanted to say that the husband laughed,
Brandi: right?
Zach: So that, that was an interesting, uh, you know, it, it kind of points at one of the fundamental problems, uh, when you create these, these systems going super micro level versus macro level and the problems that creates for like how long will, obviously the very macro or, or micro level things will take people longer to code and analyze,
Brandi: right?
Um. Right.
Zach: Is that something you’ve, you’ve thought much about for, I don’t know if you, I I don’t think you’ve created these systems, but, or have you created, helped create some of [00:28:00] those kinds of systems?
Brandi: No, I really haven’t, but, um, definitely, you know, in Paul Ekman’s facial action coding system, that’s what you are looking at is, you know, the zygomatic major contracts on the face.
You know, so you wanna recognize that these facial expressions are being made, but you’re really taking the gestalt of the entire behavior. And that’s where you get, you know, the husband laughed or the husband expressed contempt toward his wife, you know? Mm-hmm. Um, and so we’re really, I mean, it’s a great coding system because it’s also defined functionally.
So contempt has the function of expressing. Total lack of respect to a partner. And it can take different forms, you know, it can be the eye roll, it can be the pulling back of the corners of the mouth. It can be the outright insult. Um, [00:29:00] but all of those different things can be displayed at the same time or separately.
And they all convey a lack of respect. And it’s that lack of respect, which has the destructive effect on the relationship. And we call that contempt.
Zach: If you were using Gottman’s staff system, for example, would, how long would it take a, you know, someone coding, uh, to, to code that, you know, say they had an hour of footage, how long might it take them?
Would they do several passes or?
Brandi: Yeah, we, um, we code a 15 minute discussion of a disagreement and I ask my coders to watch the video through. At normal speed one time before they start the coding and then, um, go through and they code each behavior. So we are getting, you know, and sometimes this will alternate between contempt or [00:30:00] sadness and neutral behavior.
So we have kind of a code for every bit of behavior that’s exhibited, um, during that time. So a really good coder, like myself, I’ve been doing it for two decades now, probably takes me about 45 minutes to an hour to code of 15 minute discussion of disagreement. So it’s, it’s pretty intense and there’s a lot of, you know, back and forth and I’m like, did I see that right?
And then, you know, backing up and watching the whole interaction again, and then I feel I can go forward and code it. So it’s, you know, it’s a bit of an iterative, um, process.
Zach: And, uh, and different systems would, would take longer or shorter. Is that accurate to say? Yeah, like if you, if there was one that was really micro level, like ekman’s, you would have to log very minute.
Brandi: Yes. Uh,
Zach: things.
Brandi: Yeah. Yeah. And um, you know, and with Ekman’s, I mean, he was an emotion researcher too, so he [00:31:00] was really trying to get at what are the different muscle muscles that are involved in different emotional displays. But with the facial actual coating system, you don’t necessarily always see the emotion or code for the emotion.
But the staff gets, gets all the facial actions, gets the nonverbal behavior, the verbal behavior, and the intent of what’s communicated. Um, so it’s really spectacular in its predictive ability.
Zach: I’ve read a few of Ekman’s books and I’ve recommended them in my, in my poker tells ah,
Brandi: yes
Zach: books. I’ve actually thought about doing that.
Um, Ekman you know, the, the fact training. Yep. Uh,
Brandi: yep.
Zach: Would you recommend that? Have you done that yourself? I’ve
Brandi: done it. Yep. Yep. I’ve, I’ve trained in it and I’ve trained other people in it too. Yeah. It’s really, it’s really good. And I really liked, um, and this might be interesting too, too, Paul Ekman’s, um, book telling Lies, right?
And so how you can, you know, find, if you can read a person’s [00:32:00] baseline behavior, then you can start to see when they’re lying because they’ll leak emotion, you know? So I, it’s just, yeah, if you’re good human watcher. You can just pick up all sorts of stuff and you’re like, boy, I bet that person would be disappointed to know that I know what’s actually going on in their head.
Zach: So that may uh, so you would say that doing the fac training, kins fact training, if I’m saying it right, uh, you,
Brandi: yeah. Or facts. Facts, yeah.
Zach: With s on that, right? Mm-hmm. You would say that that would make you, you felt like that would make you a, a more, uh, tuned in human observer?
Brandi: Yeah. Oh, definitely.
Definitely. And some people, you know, I think it’s really important because some people just naturally kind of furrow their brows. Well, that’s good to recognize that’s their baseline behavior. It doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re annoyed. So you can learn where a person’s baseline is, and then when they go up or down from that,
Zach: it’s kinda like the folding of the arms too.
You know that this, that has a stereotypical, you [00:33:00] know, interpretation of someone being standoffish, but then some people just like to fold their arms and
Brandi: yeah, it’s just comfortable. I’m one of those people and I get asked that all the time.
Zach: Me too. Yeah. I, I fold my, I, I have to consciously tell myself to unfold my arms in certain situations.
’cause I’m like, people interpret that as being standoffish so I don’t do it. Right. Right. In certain, certain I’m, no,
Brandi: I’m just hanging out.
Zach: Right. I’m just trying to relax. Yeah. Uh,
Brandi: yeah. Same
Zach: with the, I feel like that way sometimes about like, the whole interpretation of, uh, pointing, uh, pointing your feet or legs towards people, you know, means you’re more in tune with them.
So sometimes if I’m like, right, sitting apart from someone or facing the other way, I’ll be like, they might interpret that even if it’s not true as me not being engaged. So I
Brandi: uhhuh.
Zach: So it’s like, it’s funny how we try to align with these, you know, stereotypical interpretations and even if they might not Right.
You know, be accurate in certain, certain circumstances. Yeah. Um, yeah.
Brandi: Well, a good, a good behavior, and this comes from the staff too, for [00:34:00] conveying engagement and it’s called validation, um, is back channeling. So nodding your head or saying uhhuh. Okay. And things like that. So I can be in a lecture hall giving a lecture to 200 students.
If I have one student in there who’s back channeling me, I will be able to expand on my, on the concepts I’m trying to describe. It just, you know, conveys to the listener that, Hey, I’m engaged, you’re making sense, and things like that. So that’s, it’s
Zach: validating your Yeah. Your, your presentation or your feelings or whatever.
Brandi: Exactly. Mm-hmm.
Zach: Yep. So, and that’s one of the, that’s one of the high level, uh, positive concepts. When you’re logging behavior, you’re, you’re looking for Yes. Indicators of validation.
Brandi: Yes. Yes. And a person doesn’t need to agree with what the speaker is saying. It just conveys that, yes, I’m listening. You make sense.
I understand from your perspective how you would feel this way. I may or may [00:35:00] not agree. Um, but you’re making sense. Mm-hmm. And so people will really expand on. On what they’re saying.
Zach: So I’d, I’d assume when you, when you study, when you look at unhealthy, um, bad relationships that you would see hardly any validation.
Brandi: Yeah, a lot, a lot less of it. And I mean, it’s, it happens but not as frequently. And I think this is kind of what, I’ll tell you this experience, I had really highlights how corrosive some of these negative behaviors can be. I was coding a video for of one of our distressed violent partners and had to leave for a meeting.
So I had gotten six minutes of a 15 minute videotape. Coded and I logged 90 corrosive behaviors in that. So 90 displays of contempt, criticism, belligerence, [00:36:00] defensiveness or stonewalling, um, in that six minute clip. So, you know, this is thousands of exposures to this behavior from a partner a week. And this is why these relationships does don’t survive.
Ah, you just can’t survive that. Or if you stay together, you have no quality to your relationship at all.
Zach: Mm-hmm. Do you think, so I’d assume when you’re tracking the progress of a couple like that in therapy. One indicator you would look for would be more indicators of validation.
Brandi: Yeah, more indicators.
And that’s what I actually try to train them to do. Um, so, you know, I ask them, please don’t fight, don’t have any discussions of disagreement outside of the therapy setting. And that’s to kind of minimize the exposures to these destructive behaviors and corrosive behaviors. And then we’ll handle all conflict in the therapy setting.[00:37:00]
But first I wanna build some different skills up. So build up the skills of validation, um, showing interest. Being purely angry without any other displays of contempt or anything in that. Um, and get the couples good at practicing that before we start to build in some time for discussing disagreement.
Mm-hmm. On things like that so that they have some good practice using good behaviors.
Zach: Are there some people that would criticize these types of analysis as kind of a soft or pseudoscience? Uh, because, you know, there can be that perception that a lot of this stuff depends on the point of view of the, of the person coding it, right?
Brandi: Yeah. Um, I don’t. I don’t know if they would really. So one thing that we look for, um, in our coders, and I’m constantly checking, is that we all maintain reliability in the way we [00:38:00] see the behaviors and the way we code them. So, um, a lot of our videotapes will be double coded by another coder. Mm. And then we check the reliability statistically to see if they’re matching because it’s normal for human behavior to drift, um, off its, its criteria.
And so we do lots of practice, um, in making sure that everybody in the lab sees the same behaviors the same way and code them the same way. So we really try to make it as objective as possible and, and stay true to the criterion.
Zach: Yeah, I know they do that for the specific, um, coding systems themselves.
Right. So they would take Yes, the staff and say, uh, how, how aligned are even, you know, fairly unskilled coders at, you know, coding the same footage and, and everyone aligning pretty much on the same, you know, results.
Brandi: Yep.
Zach: And that if that’s easy to, if that’s apparent that a coding system does that, then that’s an indicator that it’s a strong coding system that [00:39:00] exactly doesn’t, won’t have a lot of variety and, and results.
Brandi: Yep. Yep. That’s exactly it. And it takes a long time, I mean, a long time to get, um, to learn the coding system and get good at it. Um, I would say it takes about 12 weeks of pretty. Few hours a week practice, and you also can’t practice too long at one time because you kinda get fatigued and start to kind of fall off.
So, you know, when my lab, uh, research assistants are coding, I’m like, don’t practice for more than an hour. Just practice for an hour. Mm-hmm. Um, and then leave it and go and do something else so that you stay kind of fresh.
Zach: How much do, uh, cultural differences affect something like this trying to get.
Accurate results. Are there, are there, do you think there’s many cultural differences that would result in throwing off, uh, the results and creating more variety in the results?
Brandi: Well, there’s, there are cultural differences in [00:40:00] displays of emotion, so that’s where learning what a person’s baseline behavior looks like.
And that’s why I have all my research assistants just watch the videotape through one time fully so that you can see where that person’s baseline is, because some, um. Being here in New Mexico, we have, uh, quite a large native, uh, American Indian population here. And so I’ve been really fortunate to have a lot of American Indian couples participate in my studies, which is unique, um, across the country.
And so, um, it’s culturally more appropriate for them not to make such direct eye contact and be less direct in their discussions about things. So it’s just learning what that person’s baseline is and then where they deviate from that, or where they express anger or sadness or validation, you [00:41:00] know, from that.
Mm-hmm. So it’s just everybody experiences emotions and. Some people may not be able to identify them that well because they haven’t had that great of learning growing up in identifying their own emotional experiences, but they’re all there. Doesn’t matter what culture you’re from, it’s, but there are gonna be displayed differently and you just have to learn what that person’s baselines are.
Zach: Was it, uh, it was eckman that did work in showing that the few, a few of the most basic emotions showed up the same, you know, in facial expressions across the, you know, across the world.
Brandi: Yes. Was that his? Yes. He sure did his work. It was, it was like the four
Zach: basic ones or something. Doesn’t matter what culture.
Yeah, it was like sh showing, you know, anger and contempt and surprise or whatever. The few he Yeah,
Brandi: and disgusted.
Zach: Disgusted.
Brandi: We all show disgusted in the same way. Yes.
Zach: So I would think that would, yeah, that would, that would argue for, you know, these types of behavior and analysis because they’re so [00:42:00] oriented around anger and contempt and those kinds of things.
I argues for Yeah, there being a big crossover accuracy across cultures. Yep. You know, assuming you understand the baseline, like you said. Yeah.
Brandi: Yep. I like to think of them in terms of human experiences and they were really critical in our evolution as humans as well. Before we had language, we had to be able to read people’s facial expressions and things like that.
So yeah, they’ve just co-evolved with us.
Zach: I guess with regard to the cultural differences, I guess, uh, it, it would probably help you to see examples of, uh, healthy relationships from different cultures to get a sense of like
Brandi: mm-hmm.
Zach: Well they might be doing something slightly different in their relationship, but it works for them or something.
Brandi: Right. And I dunno if that plays
Zach: a role.
Brandi: Yeah. A good collaborator of mine, Allison Shapiro, she is now at the University of California At San Diego, or [00:43:00] no, I’m sorry. San Diego State University. Uh, she was a graduate student of John Gottman’s when I was an undergrad in the lab. And then we’ve just kept collaborating.
But for her dissertation, she, um, did. A study looking at the Anne Tdic play, which is um, two parents and their infant child. Um, and so she did a cross-cultural examination of that and looked at families in the United States, French speaking Switzerland and German speaking Switzerland for differences. And you know, the Americans, you know, were kind of gregarious and in things and these kids, you know, their parents were just totally in their faces and, you know, trying to engage them.
And it’s interesting because it would be overstimulating to the infants at times, and the infants would just tune the parents out. You know, their little brains were not [00:44:00] evolved or not developed enough at that point to really handle this overstimulation from their parents. And the French speaking Swiss and the German speaking Swiss were.
Almost more sensitive to their infant’s cues about like, you’re kind of overstimulating me right now. And so the parents would back off a little bit, but you know, we, Americans we’re like all up in your face all the time, you know?
Zach: Yeah. You gotta prepare people for life in America.
Brandi: Exactly. Because we’re right there.
Yeah. Get, get
Zach: used to it early.
Brandi: Exactly. Yeah.
Zach: Um, so.
I think you had mentioned how, uh, you can get quick reads from people. I, I, I was wondering if that affects, uh, how in your social life do people act differently around you? Like in do, when couples meet you and know what you do, are they really, uh, put on edge or something?
Brandi: Yes. They’re [00:45:00] scared. First. I’m like, I’m the biggest wet blanket at a party.
You could. You could ever imagine. But one experience I had, it was so hilarious. I walked into a party, and this was in Seattle, so everybody knew John Gottman’s work and everything, because he was just so famous in that area. And they said, oh, what do you do? And I was like, oh, I work in John Gottman’s lab, and everybody’s head’s dropped.
And I’m like, I saw that you people, what are you hiding from me? Yeah. But yeah, it’s, it’s sometimes, you know, they’re like, can you read my mind? And I’m like, oh no.
Zach: Am I gonna get divorced in a year?
Brandi: Exactly, yes. I’m like, if you will, no.
Zach: Yeah, I guess you, you probably keep that to your, to yourself if you
Brandi: I try to keep it to myself.
It feels a little intrusive to people. Yes.
Zach: Could you send them an anonymous note later and be like, I know
Brandi: you,
Zach: you’ve got some problems. Here’s what you should work on.
Brandi: Yeah, you might wanna try doing, saying it [00:46:00] this way instead of this way in the future.
Zach: Wow. Yeah, I can imagine. I mean, just, yeah, I would imagine people, people’s reactions.
I, it makes me think, I’ve read about some people that, you know, when they meet strangers because their jobs put people off, they’ll just tell ’em, you know, some less, uh, less interesting, less scary job. Yeah.
Brandi: Yes.
Zach: Yeah.
Brandi: Yeah. Much. And I mean, it’s kind of, I think I, you know, come across as empathetic and warm.
At least I try to. And, you know, so I’ll tell people I’m a psychologist and they’re like, oh, you know, they kind of immediately open up to me. Um. Is what is what probably the modal response is. Mm-hmm. Um, but yeah, at parties I can be kind of a, a, yeah. I think it’s the,
Zach: it’s the, it’s the couple’s, uh, thing. I think that throws the extra wrench in there.
Exactly.
Brandi: She’s like, oh my god, what judge about this judge? Me and
Zach: my You’re gonna watch me and my partner.
Brandi: Exactly. Exactly. [00:47:00]
Zach: Mm-hmm. So one of the reasons I was interested in talking to you so much was because I’ve done a good amount of behavior analysis myself for my poker, uh, yes. Books and videos. So I, when I was writing my second book, verbal Poker Tales, which I uhhuh worked on for eight months full time, it was a, it took me a lot longer than I thought it would basically.
And I was reviewing thousands of televised poker hands and logging them in this spreadsheet I had. Uh, yeah, so, and I came up with a, you know, a shorthand coding system for like different verbal patterns that I could then, you know, go back and look at for these, you know, how they appeared in different spots, Uhhuh.
Uh, so that was, that was a big challenge for me to actually. Can relate to a lot of the, you know, when I, when I look at the, uh, the different behavior coding systems for, for psych psychological purposes, I can relate a lot because I was facing that challenge of like, well, I wanna log a good amount of detail, but I don’t wanna, you know, go into so much detail that it’s gonna take me forever to log the footage.
You know? Yes. But I, at the same time, I want [00:48:00] enough information that I can go back and, and make use of it. So it was kind of an interesting challenge finding that line of like, going to micro or going to too macro. Um,
Brandi: absolutely. Yeah. And if you go to micro, then you pull in a bunch of stuff that doesn’t predict anything and yeah, you just get kind of bogged down.
Zach: So, uh, what about your work on the brain patterns, the asymmetry, and the relationship to alcohol and violence? Can you summarize a little bit of that work and what. Stuff in the brain you were tracking.
Brandi: Yeah. This, um, is some really fun work that we’re just getting published now. So in these, um, studies that we were doing, so we, you know, had couples come in, they have a discussion of disagreement.
We code that with the SP specific affect coding system, and then we brought back a partner who self-reported using more physical aggression. If both partners were the same in their displays of [00:49:00] self-reported physical aggression, then we randomly selected one of those partners to come back and then we match them to a distressed nonviolent partner of the same sex, roughly the same relationship satisfaction in age.
And we had the, um, distress violent partner come back and we hooked them up to all sorts of neurophysiological equipment. So, um, to a brain EEG electroencephalography, um, to collect their brain activity, um, cardiac activity. So they were, um, hooked up to an ECG electrocardiogram. We had sensors that read how much skin their skin was perspiring.
And then, um, I have an eye tracking system that would record. Their pupil dilations as a measure of being physiologically aroused. And so they came [00:50:00] back into the session, they’re hooked up to all of this equipment, and in one session they were given a placebo beverage that smelled and tasted like an alcoholic beverage.
And then in another session, um, we actually mixed an alcoholic beverage, um, according to their weight and height and sex that would get them up to a 0.08, uh, blood alcohol concentration. And so they drank the alcohol beverage and then we had them watch these video clips. Of contempt, criticism, defensiveness, belligerence, and stonewalling from their partner.
And then an equal number of clips of neutral behavior. So just information exchanges like we’re gonna go to sue and bills for dinner on Sunday, and we recorded the changes in their brain activity. So in frontal alpha asymmetry, if there is any, any asymmetry, [00:51:00] and it’s to the left. That has typically been associated with feeling more positive emotions and having a motivation to approach.
Some stimuli. Usually it’s something petitive or pleasant.
Zach: Hmm.
Brandi: Um, and then if there’s, so that’s, and that’s,
Zach: uh, and that’s blood like accumulating in that section of the brain basically. Uh,
Brandi: these are electrical signals.
Zach: Oh, electrical signals, okay.
Brandi: Yep. In that part of the brain and the front left hemisphere of the brain.
Mm-hmm.
Zach: So just more activity, more more electrical activity in that section.
Brandi: Exactly. Yep. If there was more, um, activity in the right hemisphere that’s been associated with more negative emotions and a tendency to withdraw from stimuli. And so there’s been a lot of basic research around that and they actually found that anger actually also causes this increase in left frontal activity, even though it’s typically associated with positive emotions.
Hmm. But it’s [00:52:00] really because this approach, motivation might be helpful in rectifying a situation that’s making you angry. So with our distressed violent partners and their matched controls, we actually found that when our distressed violent partners were administered alcohol and just during a baseline recording task, they weren’t seeing any video clips or anything.
They actually exhibited much greater right activity, which is typically associated with negative emotions. Whereas the distressed nonviolent partners, um, exhibited more left activity. I mean, it was just an amazing split, um, in behavior. So it really is kind of getting at probably what are the long-term effects of being in these kind of corrosive relationships and how does that, you know, change the way your brain responds.
When the partners were drinking placebo beverages, we didn’t see these differences. [00:53:00] At all. Mm-hmm. They were very similar. So alcohol really contributed to the allowance of negative emotions to kind of push through. Probably these folks were probably able to remember more negative, um, memories easier and things like that, that then caused their brain activity to change.
Um, but then when they were shown these evocative, corrosive clips of their partner’s behavior, then the distressed violent partners shifted way to the left. So they became much more likely to engage, um, their partner when they were intoxicated, uh, than when they weren’t intoxicated. So I think that’s pretty important finding there for understanding why alcohol is so commonly related to intimate partner violence.
Zach: Mm-hmm. Uh, what would you use for the. Alcohol. The fake alcohol placebo.
Brandi: Yeah. So we, um, use a hundred proof vodka and cranberry [00:54:00] juice. And so to make the placebo beverage, we serve it in a red solo cup. ’cause that’s a good cue for drinking. You know, every party you’ve ever been to, you’ve had to drink in a red solo cup.
And so we’re trying to control for things like that as well. Expectations around drinking. Um, and so we take the cup and we missed it. We have a little spray bottle, we missed it with the a hundred proof vodka. We fill it with the measured volume of cranberry juice, and then we float three milliliters of vodka, vodka on top.
So it has alcohol, has lower specific gravity than other liquids, and so it’ll float
Zach: so it floats.
Brandi: So it tastes and smells like they’re getting an alcohol beverage. And you can totally tell they’ll sip it just like they do, you know, the other alcohol beverage. That’s interesting. Things like that. It’s also a good
Zach: tip for throwing a cheap party.
Brandi: Exactly. There you go. Yeah. You’re watered down drinks.
Zach: Yeah. Then you can see which of your [00:55:00] friends are pretending to be drunk. Yeah,
Brandi: exactly. Yeah.
Zach: That that, that actually sounds like a pretty fun idea.
Brandi: Okay. Yes. I think I might share that. Well, and there’s actually been some research around that. Um, Alan Marlatt, he’s passed away now, but he was really one of the first alcohol researchers who had a bar lab and found that just the cues.
You are consuming alcohol, were enough to lead to all of the gregarious, kind of drunk acting behavior in people.
Zach: Yep. Placebo is a hell of a thing. It’s
Brandi: a very strong effect. Yes, it sure is. Yeah.
Zach: Uh, so is that, have you done other brain scanning work besides that project?
Brandi: I’ve done some other, um, EEG brain scanning work, um, trying to predict who would drop out of substance use treatment in a prison inmate population, um, because there’s such a high prevalence of substance use and they’re at such high risk for accidental [00:56:00] overdose deaths after they’re released.
So we found that, you know, brain activity to just a very kind of simple cognitive neuroscience task of like, you know, pressing a button when you see an X and trying to not press a button when you see the X in a box, um, was enough to predict. From their brain activity, who would drop out of treatment early.
Huh.
Zach: Wow.
Brandi: Yeah. And so we’ve done that also with FMRI. And the other interesting thing with that brain prediction, those studies, we actually use machine learning to determine what were the features of the brain activity that were most predictive of who drop outta treatment and who would use substances again after treatment.
Zach: Oh, so you’re using some, are you using some sort of, um, uh, machine learning Yep. Software that you’ve, you apply to this? Yep.
Brandi: Yep. That my collaborators have developed? Yeah.
Zach: What, what is that called? Can I ask what that is? Or is it, [00:57:00] does it have a name? Um,
Brandi: no, it doesn’t have a special name. It just happens to be the algorithm that we’ve used and the.
You know, technique that we use to validate the, the thing. Yeah. But just lowering, lowering math stuff
Zach: to most people. Yeah. It’s, yeah, the machine learning AI kind of stuff is very interesting. Yes. Do you think, um, I was wondering if you thought, you know, are we gonna see some, some pretty amazing, um, results in the near future of breakthroughs of like recognizing, uh, thoughts or intentions in, in from brain scans, you know, in the near future?
Because I know I’ve, I occasionally see work being done on that kind of stuff. Uh, but what’s your, what’s your thought on the state of that kind of research? Yeah,
Brandi: I, I am sure will see some things because there, um, there, you know, some work with stimulating certain areas of the brain that, you know, cause certain behaviors, um, and things like that that, yeah, I’m sure as we, as our technology continues to develop in our.[00:58:00]
Algorithms for doing these sorts of things, I, I’m sure they will. Mm-hmm. I’m sure they will. They kind of are running, you know, the scientific area and what we’re wanting to learn about human behavior and, and these features of. Brain and behavior, um, to predict, you know, clinical diagnoses and things like that kind of runs independently of light.
I think what folks are doing kind of more in the AI or artificial intelligence area to a degree, if they came together, they’d probably be, you know, some pretty revolutionary things going on.
Zach: Mm-hmm. So, yeah. I should mention here too, if anyone, if other, uh, scientists are listening, I’ve, I’ve, I’ve always thought it would be interesting to take a lot of those measurement, um, things you talked about, hooking people up to heart rates.
Mm-hmm. Skin conductance, sprain scans. I always thought that would be great to do a, uh, poker related study for that, just because
Brandi: Absolutely.
Zach: I would think I would, poker just has so many distinct situations that [00:59:00] you could compare and, uh, a wide range of emotions in specific spots, you know, like bluffing or, you know, having a strong hand.
So I, I thought, I always thought that would be, I, I haven’t seen anyone do that, but I just think. I’ve had ideas on how to set that up. So I thought I’d mention in case anyone in listening in the future might, uh, be interested in that. ’cause I, I, I think that, I think some of the problems that I’ve seen with, ’cause I have seen some poker related studies.
Mm-hmm. Not necessarily the measurement, uh, taking a lot of measurements, but I think what happens with some of those studies is not having a good understanding of, of poker leads to some bad setup of the, of the experiment. You know, so they’re
Brandi: Oh,
Zach: sure. ’cause they don’t understand the different situations that, you know, and how they, how those situations compare to each other and how they’re related or dissimilar.
Right. I think it leads to some bad, you know, just some bad write-ups and and analysis of, of their studies they do. So,
Brandi: yeah. Yeah. And it’s probably hard because, you know, in science, even though my couples are looking at different. Displays of, [01:00:00] you know, it’s all individualized stimuli. It’s still, here’s 25 clips of negative stimuli, here’s 25 clips of positive stimuli, which allows us to control, you know, for some of that variance in there too.
Mm-hmm. Um, but the other physiological measure that is really interesting to me, um, in this couple’s work and I think would be related to the poker playing, is heart rate variability, which is a measure of your parasympathetic nervous system activation, which is very critical. So if you have good high heart rate variability, which means your heart is beating like beat, beat, beat.
Speed, you’re better able to adapt to changing, um, interceptive. So stimuli experiences internal to you as well as external to you. [01:01:00] And so if you have good, high, high heart rate variability, you’re less, um, likely to be reactive in situations. You’re able to kind of step back, appraise the situation and, and decide how to act.
Um, so probably poker players who have really good high heart rate variability would be able to. Respond adaptively and not get kind of rattled by a high pressure
Zach: situations. So you’re saying, so it’s not a bad thing for your heart to go boom, boom, boom, boom, in a, in a random way, like you’re saying there’s, there’s, there’s some natural chaos there.
That is, is a good thing,
Brandi: yes. That is healthy and yeah, so low heart rate variability, where we think of a typical heart rate of beat, beat, beat, beat, beat. Mm-hmm. That actually, um, is hard on your cardiovascular system too. So you’re also much more likely to have cardiovascular disease. [01:02:00]
Zach: Oh. It’s
Brandi: associated with other psychological disorders like depression.
Zach: ’cause it just doesn’t change. It’s so, it just doesn’t change. It just barrels ahead at a, at, at whatever speed it’s set. Yeah. So, yeah. So you’re saying that the abil, the physiological ability of the body to make a quick change to its. State represented by the heart rate
Brandi: Yeah.
Zach: Is associated with other, you know, just being able to, to change tracks emotionally or psychologically in general.
Brandi: Absolutely. Absolutely.
Zach: Wow, that’s
Brandi: wild. Yeah. And so one thing I’m looking at doing is using heart rate variability biofeedback. So you can train up your parasympathetic nervous system with just a, like an easy device like the mwa E-M-W-A-V-E. Um, it’s sold by HeartMath, that’s the one I use in the lab. Um, and you can do it, you can change your HRV or heart rate variability in like 10 days, um, by practicing with that.
And [01:03:00] so you just practice breathing at your heart’s resonant frequency. And so you really need a biofeedback device to do that because, um, everyone’s resonant frequency is different.
Zach: Well, yeah. It sounds like something that, I mean, besides poker, it just sounds like something that would be good in, you know, for mental, having more mental control in general for anything, any activity.
Yeah.
Brandi: Yeah. And especially my distressed violent couples whose conflict gets outta control. Really important to train up this parasympathetic nervous system portion of your autonomic nervous system so that you’ll, you know, they can kind of regulate themselves better.
Zach: Right. So it’s not something ingrained, even though it might start out that way.
Like you’re saying this Yeah. This low heart rate variability, people might be, tend to have one or the other, um, of that kind of trait. But y yeah. You’re saying you can change that with some
Brandi: Yep.
Zach: With some practice. Yeah.
Brandi: Yep. If you’re under chronic stress, [01:04:00] that will reduce your heart rate variability.
Mm-hmm. So exercise. Increases your heart rate variability. So that’s why like exercise for depression is, um, about as effective as taking an antidepressant.
Zach: Oh wow.
Brandi: Yeah.
Zach: Yeah. So it’s basically just making you more mentally limber and able to be flexible and
Brandi: Absolutely
Zach: different situations. Yeah.
Brandi: Huh. Yeah, it’s pretty incredible.
Yeah, it’s,
Zach: it’s really interesting ’cause it’s like gets to that whole, you know, uh, the so many things that we think of as. As our, you know, our, our conscious choices are are, you know,
Brandi: yeah.
Zach: Dictated by these under the scene, you know, behind the scenes, uh, physical, you know, attributes and Yeah, even if we can change them.
But again, we start out setting these in these ways.
Brandi: Yeah.
Zach: That’s interesting.
Brandi: Yeah. And with our, um, couples of, or our studies of distressed violent couples who, I mean, they just, their heart rate variability is [01:05:00] in the basement. It’s just really, really low. So I’m very interested in trying that. But we also see that one thing that distinguishes like a happily married couple versus an unhappily married couple is that.
Before they say something to their partner, they’re able to kind of take a millisecond and think about how that’s gonna land. How will this statement make my partner feel? You have to have high heart rate variability in order to be able to do that, to stop yourself before you say something. You know, so I’m, am I gonna express pure anger here or contempt here?
And they make a choice. It’s a choice. You know, it’s not an automatic thing. It may be in your learning history, but you’re choosing to be critical and make a critical statement to your partner, um, in that instance. So anything I can do to help give people a little bit longer so that they can make a better choice for themselves, I’m interested in doing that.[01:06:00]
Zach: Are there other applications for this work besides therapy and psych studies? Do people use these kinds of behavior coding systems in, for example, business or other, you know, like negotiation situations or anything like that?
Brandi: I think there’s probably been some folks who have tried a little bit, but there probably not, you know, trained up to the degree that we are in the area of science.
Zach: Yeah, it seems like something that you could theoretically apply some of the ideas to like analyzing, um, you know, interactions with, uh, you know, hostage situations or something, you know, like
Brandi: Yes.
Zach: I don’t know. Some of it would map over maybe, but
Brandi: not all
Zach: of it. Yeah.
Brandi: But I think too just, you know, negotiations, you know, and being able to be sensitive, you know, and being able to really watch human behavior and know what it correlates with and what emotional states that person’s exhibiting.
I think in negotiating. [01:07:00] Situations, you know, you can see when someone’s getting tense and mm-hmm. As the speaker, maybe you can do something to help soothe that person, you know, to kind of get them out of that state so that the negotiations can proceed on a, you know, more positive track.
Zach: Yeah. I would imagine your work would make you a very strong negotiator.
Just being able to sense, you know, the indicators of hostility or disappointment or whatever.
Brandi: Yeah, yeah. And being okay to acknowledge it too, and saying, you know, you look like you’re really getting tense right now. Maybe we should take a break.
Zach: For
Brandi: a couple minutes.
Zach: Mm-hmm. Right. Doing and doing, drawing attention to it.
Non nonjudgmentally.
Brandi: Yeah. And uh, yeah, and with couples work, you know, that’s what we recommend too. If you’re getting to this state where you’re so physiologically amped up, you cannot have a productive discussion in that physiological state. It’s impossible. [01:08:00] So you really need to stop and go and do something different, and don’t ruminate about what your partner has done or said.
Mm-hmm. You have to go and just engage in some other activity altogether. Think about something, you know, go clean the garage, go take a walk and pick flowers or whatever. But you have to really not think about what your partner was saying or doing, because you’ll maintain that physiological arousal. And when you come back together, you’re just at square one and you just.
You know, erupt again.
Zach: Yeah. I saw the, uh, diagram you had helped create. I think you had helped create it, it had your name on it. Anyway, Uhhuh, but yeah, it was, it was showing a kind of flow chart of what you just talked about. Like when this happens, you know, go off for 20 minutes and
Brandi: Yep.
Zach: Try to decompress and not think about it.
Yeah.
Brandi: Yep. Yep. Exactly.
Zach: So, uh, yeah, I think we’ve, uh, hit a pretty decent stopping point. Okay. Are there any, uh, any, anything you wanna mention as far as, um, projects [01:09:00] you’re working on now or, or, uh, causes you’d wanna mention that are, that are, uh, important to you?
Brandi: Yeah, well I think what, um, some studies we’re gonna be starting over the summer, um, are looking at doing some neuro imaging.
With couples doing, um, FMRI neuroimaging. So we’ve found that these brain, the brain is more active. Um, and we have more activity when people have been drinking and are reviewing these specific clips. And now I’m interested in actually the associated brain regions and doing things like heart rate variability to improve activation of brain regions that would be involved in.
Helping people stop and kind of think about their behavior before they engage in it. So from more of a mechanistic perspective. And then I think one thing maybe I’d like to, [01:10:00] you know, say to couples, you know, who might be listening and thinking about their own relationships is no matter what you do, do not fight when you’ve been drinking, just don’t do it.
Mm-hmm. Um, you’ll, you know, if you don’t have a history of getting physically aggressive in your relationship, you’re likely to say things that, um, are hurtful in that situation. So just don’t do it. Um, and if you feel yourself getting really too agitated and you feel like your heart is racing too much, and during a conflict with a partner, stop.
Go and take 30 minutes to do something else. It’ll take a person at least 20 minutes just to calm down when they’re not thinking about the things their partner has said. So go do something that’s enjoyable to you. Go take a run, go take a walk around the block, go clean the garage, go empty the dishwasher, and don’t think about what your partner has said and then try to come back to [01:11:00] it.
And if it starts to escalate again, stop again. And sometimes, um, it’s okay not to resolve a conflict. That just is pretty typical. I.
Zach: And I’d say the other big takeaway for general relationship advice seems to me that be recognizing how, um, damaging those, um, contemptuous kind of indicators
Brandi: Yeah.
Zach: Uh, are for to, to your partner and your, and your whole relationship.
Brandi: Yeah, absolutely. And really try to treat your partner the way you would treat a friend. I think when we get in close intimate relationships and have a girlfriend, boyfriend, or spouse, uh, people forget that that person deserves kind treatment, just like you would treat any other friend. And if you do that, you’re gonna have a much more satisfying relationship.
For sure.
Zach: Yeah. I think it’s, it’s the, you know, I, I, I think the, you know, [01:12:00] taking, taking your partner for granted it is a
Brandi: yes is a common
Zach: pitfall. Yes. You know, and you, you start feeling like. You know, well, I can say anything to this person
Brandi: Yes. Or something,
Zach: you know. Yes. Or it doesn’t really matter ’cause we’re gonna be together anyway, so.
Right,
Brandi: right. Yeah. And even if you do stay together, your relationship quality will be awful. Mm-hmm. And I, the other thing I think I’ll mention, you know, these behaviors, um, these contemptuous critical defensiveness, stonewalling and belligerent behaviors, we can take those behaviors and predict how many infectious illnesses the partner will have in the next year.
So they really take a toll on the receivers.
Zach: Oh.
Brandi: Immune system. Right. And for men, their marital satisfaction or relationship satisfaction at age 50 predicts their health at age 80. So these are really, really important, um, things and if you have a lot [01:13:00] of negativity in your relationship. You are just being flooded with cortisol all the time.
Mm-hmm. Which just corrodes your cardiovascular system and so. We can see in couples who have a really good satisfying and stable relationship, they’re kind to each other. They’re thoughtful to each other. That relationship will actually buffer both partners from any other really negative life events that they have.
Mm-hmm. So it’s, you know, our, we’re evolved. We’re a social species. We do pair bond, and so the quality of those relationships are really, have been so critical for our survival, um, over the millennia. They have a really big impact on our health if they’re not mm-hmm. You know, if they’re good and bad, they have a big impact on our health.
Zach: Yeah. [01:14:00] Those small choices you make in how you talk to your partner, impact, impact your future happiness.
Brandi: Absolutely.
Zach: It’s kind of important.
Brandi: Yep. Yep. Very much.
Zach: Huh. I was gonna mention too, just a quick mention because we didn’t get around talking too much about it. Mm-hmm. But your simpler video tool that you helped build that was because that’s.
To describe it, it wasn’t related to a specific kind of coding strategy. It was a tool for researchers to put in whatever video they were going to be analyzing and then just help them code that, uh, footage
Brandi: Yep.
Zach: Quickly and easily. So it, yeah, it gave you, it gave you a quick, easy way to input the different codes and easy way to access those codes.
And it also allowed you to jump to specific, uh, spots where you would log those codes really easily.
Brandi: Yep, yep. And I’ve used it in all sorts of human coding. So video coding or just audio coding. You can use it with just audio coding too. [01:15:00] And my collaborators have also used it in coding of animal behavior.
Animal social behavior, um, and animal behavior after exposure to different drugs and things like that as well. So we tried to make it, you know, a really flexible tool that was, um, easy for researchers to use and it’s free. And so all researchers who are always doing the research on a shoestring budget, you know, really, really appreciate that.
So.
Zach: Oh, yeah, it sounded really useful. I mean, I was just imagining using it. I could have used it when I was doing my poker Yes. Logging because I mean, I also saw, you know, you could act, you could correct me if I’m wrong, but it’s, it, you could output the, the sections, the specific, uh, time ranges of things you’d log, and then it would output those Yep.
Snippets to, if you want to just pick those snippets and study them, we could output them all.
Brandi: Yep.
Zach: Uh, yep. Yeah, it was just sounded very useful. Exactly.
Brandi: Yeah. Yeah, we tried to make it as useful and flexible and, uh, shout out to Dan Bartow who did all the [01:16:00] coding, computer coding for it. So he’s a really great programmer.
Zach: Okay. This has been great. Yeah, very interesting. Um, thanks. Yeah, so thanks a lot Dr. Fink, for coming on. It was very great talking to you, and I really appreciate your time.
Brandi: Yeah, my pleasure. I had a great time talking to you too. I love my work and so I just really appreciate any opportunity to talk about it, so thanks.
Zach: All right. Thanks a lot. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Bye-bye.
Brandi: Take care. Bye-bye.
Zach: I hope you enjoyed this episode of the People Who Read People Podcast. If you did enjoy it, please leave a review or a rating on the platform that you listen on. I don’t have that many reviews, so that’d be much appreciated. Also, if you wanna know more about me or the podcast, you can go to my site Reading Poker Tells Video.
I have information about my poker behavior work on there. And I also have a blog where I give details and links for the podcast episodes. And as always, if you have ideas for an interesting person to interview, [01:17:00] I always appreciate hearing those. You can send those to me on the contact form on my Reading Poker Tells Video site.
Alright, take care. Bye.
The latest “People Who Read People” episode is an interview with two people who’ve both had success in door-to-door sales:
Links to the episode:
Some topics discussed:
My eighth People Who Read People podcast episode is an interview with Robin Dibble. Robin is an experienced Albuquerque-area service industry professional who’s worked all sides of the business, from waiting tables, to cooking, to managing restaurants and night clubs.
Most recently, he helped open and manage Poki Poblano in Albquerque, which just recently shut down but racked up some great Yelp reviews in the 10 months it was open. Robin is also available for restaurant consultation/strategizing, especially for people new to the restaurant business. His Twitter is @dibblerobin and his Instagram is @dr._.dibbs.
Links to the episode:
Some topics discussed:
My seventh ‘People Who Read People’ podcast episode is an interview with Robert Drysdale. Drysdale is a well-known Brazilian jiu-jitsu and mixed martial arts expert, champion, and trainer. If you’d like to know more about him, you can read his Wikipedia. He currently operates a training gym in Las Vegas: Drysdale Jiu-Jitsu.
Links to the episode:
In this episode, we talk about:
My sixth ‘People Who Read People’ podcast episode is an interview with Seth Baldwin. Seth is an experienced fencer (swords, not fence posts) who, at the peak of his career, finished 3rd in 2004 at the U.S. National Championships and was 7th alternate for the Olympic fencing team.
Links to the episode:
In this episode, we talk about:
My fifth ‘People Who Read People’ podcast episode is an interview with Jenny Radcliffe (www.jennyradcliffe.com), who goes by the title “The People Hacker”. She’s an expert in social engineering (aka, the manipulation of people to achieve access to goods or information) and non-verbal behavior and psychology. She offers her infiltration services (aka penetration testing or pen-testing) to corporations who want to test their susceptibility to social engineering and in-person hacking, and is a frequent speaker at security-related events. She offers consultation services, gives seminars, and has given TEDx talks. She has her own podcast: The Human Factor. She’s on Twitter at @jenny_radcliffe.
Links to the episode:
In our talk, we discuss:
In August of 2018 I interviewed an acquaintance, Jon Bismut, who’s a big pinball aficionado/player/fan. He’s not a big name in the pinball world, but he knows enough that I thought it would make an interesting interview for people, like myself, who don’t know much about pinball. One thing that initially struck my interest and made me want to interview him was him saying how big an edge highly-skilled pinball players have on lesser opponents; it’s a very big edge. This was surprising to me, being a novice who usually can’t last more than a few seconds on a pinball machine, so I wanted to delve into what makes a great pinball player and what makes it such a skill game.
Also, did you know that “tilting” in poker has its origin (so it’s widely assumed) from when pinball machines would go on Tilt from being jostled too much? Just an interesting poker connection.
My fourth ‘People Who Read People’ podcast episode is an interview with David Zulawski, an expert in interrogation and interview techniques. Zulawski is the cofounder of Wicklander Zulawski and Associates, a company that consults and trains people on interrogation and interviewing. Before starting that business in 1982, he worked in several law enforcement and investigative positions; he’s been a licensed polygraph examiner, a licensed private investigator, and a certified fraud examiner.
Links to the show on different platforms (some stuff we talked about is below that):
I was honored to get a chance a couple months ago to talk to high-stakes poker player Brian Rast. The YouTube video is below. It’s rare to get a high-stakes players insights into poker strategy or tells, as many, for good reason, don’t want other high-stakes opponents to get insight about their game. So it’s great that Rast was willing to talk honestly about his stances on how important behavior/tells are in poker. I also plan on updating my Exploiting Poker Tells book in the near future with a few updates, and that would include some snippets from this interview.
This conversation was what led to my decision to start doing the People Who Read People podcast. Unfortunately, I wasn’t planning on doing anything with the audio when I recorded it, so the audio is quite bad, and I’ve decided to just put this interview up on Youtube, and not on iTunes and the other podcast platforms.
My third ‘People Who Read People’ podcast was an interview with Dr. Christina Marinakis, an expert on jury selection and voir dire. She is currently the Director of Jury Research at Litigation Insights, a trial consultancy firm. She has also contributed to the second edition of the book Pattern Voir Dire Questions. For a transcript of this talk, see this post.
Some things we talk about in this podcast:
Links to the show:
A talk with Mark McClish, a former US Marshal, and a longtime trainer of law enforcement personnel in interrogation/interview techniques. He has written two books on his statement analysis techniques: I Know You Are Lying, and Don’t Be Deceived. These are great books; the first book was one of the inspirations for me writing my book Verbal Poker Tells.
This podcast is meant to serve as an introduction to some statement analysis concepts. We talk briefly about quite a few cases, new and old, including OJ Simpson, Timothy McVeigh, Chris Watts, Making A Murderer, the KROQ radio DJ hoax, the McStay family murder, and the Van Dam child murder.
A transcript is below.
Here are links to this episode:
If you’d like to read some in-depth analysis of the Chris Watts statements, check out this blog post.
TRANSCRIPT
[Note: transcripts will contain errors.]
Zach: So today is September 6th, 2018, and this is the People Who Read People Podcast. My name’s Zachary Elwood and today we have as a guest, mark mcclish and I’ll give you a quick introduction of, uh, Mark’s background taken from his website, statement analysis.com. Mark is a retired supervisory Deputy United States Marshal with 26 years of federal law enforcement experience.
From 1991 to 1999, he taught interviewing techniques at the US Marshals Service Training Academy, which is located at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Georgia. During that time, he conducted research on deceptive language. He calls his method for examining people’s words, state statement analysis.
He actually has a registered trademark of that that Mark has registered. Mark has written two books. I know you are lying, and the second one is Don’t Be Deceived. And I just wanna vouch that [00:01:00] these are very good books. In fact, my own second book about poker tells, which was called Verbal Poker Tells, was partially inspired by reading Mark’s first book.
Mark’s work will help make you a better listener and will help you better understand written and verbal communication in my opinion. Without further ado, here’s Mark. Uh, good morning, mark. Good morning Zach. Thanks for coming on the show. And we’re gonna talk about some of your, uh, work today and, and hopefully give people an introduction to, um, you know, what they can learn from, from your work and how it will help them in their daily lives.
So let’s start from the top. For people who are new to your work, what’s your short, if you were gonna give a short elevator pitch for the value of statement analysis and. How it works. Uh, what would you say?
Mark: Well, statement analysis is the process of examining a, a person’s verbal or written statement to determine if they’re being, uh, truthful or deceptive.
And, and the reason the techniques work is that there are several ways you can phrase a statement, and people will always [00:02:00] word their statement based on all their knowledge, which means their statement may contain information they did not intend to share. Uh, PE people often give us more information than what they realize.
But unfortunately, they sometimes give us more information on what we realize and all gets down to listening to how a person phrases their statement. And the other reason, uh, the techniques work is because most of the techniques are based on the English language, such as, uh, word definitions and the rules of grammar.
And then lastly, when we examine a statement, we do not interpret what a person is saying. And that’s ’cause people mean exactly what they say, but too oftentimes we, a person says one thing and, and we hear something different. I mean, years ago, a sportscaster, Marv Albert got into some trouble and he came out with a statement and said that he is going to, that he intended to Vly defend himself.
Well, the key word was intent. He didn’t say he will defend himself, he just intended to. And then later on he pled guilty. And a lot of people were surprised. But if you listen to what [00:03:00] he is saying. You could almost see a guilty plea coming, you know, in the distance. So it all gets down to listening.
Zach: Right.
And one of the big things in your book is, you know, you talk about listening carefully to what people tell you. And, and like you said, people read into things. So the, you know, they’ll say something vague, indirect, and we absorb what they, they want us to hear without, you know, listening to the very subtle things that give us clues that they’re not telling the whole truth or that they’re actually saying something else.
Uh, right. Okay. So, uh. How does the analysis of verbal behavior, in your opinion, differ and compare to nonverbal physical behavioral analysis?
Mark: Well, with nonverbals, you know, reading somebody’s body language, uh, obviously one a person has to be present and we have to view their mannerisms. I. If we’re gonna rely on their non verbs, but with statement analysis, they don’t have to be present, which means we could use the statement analysis techniques, uh, in a telephone conversation, or we could use the statement analysis techniques if we’re [00:04:00] analyzing a written statement.
Obviously you can’t apply, um, non verbs in those types of situations, but with body language, you have to establish a norm. Uh, what, you know, establish a baseline. What is this person’s normal body movements? And then later you look for the abnormal gestures. They, they rub the back of their neck or, uh, comb their hair or something like that.
But this creates a problem and that sometimes we forget to establish that baseline. Or if you’re watching an interview on television, that interview is probably 20 minutes long. They edit down to 10 minutes for their broadcast and they cut all that chitchat. You, you don’t have an opportunity to establish that baseline.
But with statement analysis, we don’t have to establish a baseline for the far majority of the techniques. And that’s because people mean exactly, uh, what they say. And then with non verbs, it’s not always specific. Just because somebody performs an abnormal gesture doesn’t necessarily mean they’re being deceptive at that point in their statement.
Now, it may [00:05:00] indicate you’re, you’re hitting a hot spot or something like that. But the statement itself, um, may be a truthful statement, whereas again, with statement analysis, it’s, it’s, uh, it’s very specific because people mean exactly what they say. And that’s, so that’s some of the differences between reading somebody’s body language, which you have to somewhat interpret, versus statement analysis, which in which there is no interpretation.
Zach: It kind of ring, it rings true for me because working on the, uh, the Verbal Poker Tales book, uh, I learned a lot just writing the book because I spent a lot of time researching, you know, clips from, uh, televised poker and taking notes when I played. And I just found that after I was done with that book compared to the things I’d written about non-verbal, I just, you know, I, I, I really believe the, the verbal stuff was so much more actionable and reliable.
Because it, you know, it just contains more inf clear information to me when that information is present. And, uh, I think it, I think it has a corollary there. Obviously, poker’s different from. Other things, but I think it, it, there’s, there’s just a lot of information there. [00:06:00] Um, so your first book, I know you are lying.
I found very much eyeopening. I’ve read it three times. This book has so much interesting stuff in it. It’s a real period piece of crime from the late eighties and nineties. Uh, a few topics covered in the book job in a Ramsey Woody Allen accusations, Michael Jackson accusations, bill Clinton statements, OJ Simpson, and a lot more.
Uh. It’s interesting to read, just, uh, as kind of a, taking you back to that time and realizing how many, uh, you know, kind of epic, crazy, uh, news stories were happening around that time. And, and, and you talk about a lot of them and, and find very interesting patterns and, and information in the things that people say in those interviews.
Uh, so one of the things I wanted to do was we’ll play one clip from, uh, of an interesting example you talk about in your book. And to set this up a little bit, this is from. 1990, and these are two Los Angeles DJs who had a funny radio talk show. They had a caller call in [00:07:00] at one point during one of their shows who confessed to murdering his girlfriend.
And then there was a big police investigation to try to find out if it was a real call. Uh, many people wondered whether it was a hoax by the two DJs and the show, unsolved Mysteries did a feature on the story and they interviewed the 2D DJs. So we’ll play a clip right now from that show.
TV show: We asked them point blank if the call was a hoax created to boost their ratings.
Um, there are, there are real definite lines that you do not cross. Um, obviously everybody’s, you know, trying to get ratings, trying to get notice, trying to be this and that, but there are lines that you just don’t cross, and that’s one of ’em. Um, yeah, I, I, I don’t know that anyone could sit down and say someone confessing to murder will make our ratings go up.
Zach: So that was the first dj and then the second DJ clip starts.
DJ: Um, you know, all we could say is, you know what the, the experts feel that this guy was legitimate. It’s no one we know. And as you know, as far as we’re concerned, you know, that that’s his story. We certainly [00:08:00] hope it’s not true. You know, I trade whatever publicity we got from it, you know, for the story not to be true.
’cause it’s pretty grim really.
Zach: Okay, so I thought I picked this clip of these two guys because I thought it was a good, uh, a good example of having quite a few of the things you talk about in your book in one place. Uh, do you want to talk a little bit about what jumps out to you? Obviously, you know a lot about that clip.
Mark: Well, the first thing we see is despite both DJs giving a very lengthy answer, neither one of ’em answered the specific question. Uh, the question was, is the call a host created boost your ratings? And so if they wanna deny that they have to say no, and they can say every, all they said, and then, and by saying no, or say no to the very beginning and, and then keep on talking.
’cause sometimes people don’t wanna just say yes or no, they want to expound. Nothing wrong with that, but you have to answer that specific question. Neither one of them did. So that means absolutely they’re, they’re withholding some information. And then the first DJ start out saying that there are real different lines that you do not [00:09:00] cross.
And in statement analysis, we take the approach that we’re gonna believe what people tell us. And we notice that he used the pronoun you, there are real different lines that you do not cross. And I believe him that you and I wouldn’t cross those lines, but he couldn’t say there are real definite lines that I would not cross or, or we would not cross.
Referring to both DJs and so that that stood out, you know, pretty glaring. If you look at the pronouns, he’s not personalizing it, but he is just talking in general terms, wanting you to believe that he is talking about himself, but he is not. Mm-hmm. And the second DJ start out saying, uh, all we can say.
You know, is that the experts feel this guy was legitimate. Well, when people say, you know, all I know, or all I can say, they’re telling us they’re limited in what they can share with us. When people say, all I know, they’re limited by their knowledge, but when people say, all I can say. They’re probably limited by something else.
And what you should ask yourself is, is why is this all you can say? [00:10:00] What are you limited by in this case? Right? What’s stopping you? Yeah. What’s stopping you from giving more information? Apparently not your knowledge. All I know, but all I can say. So there’s usually a difference, uh, between the two. And then we have a rule and statement analysis that the shortest sentence is the best sentence.
You know, extra words give us extra information. And, and the first DJ concluded his statement by saying, you know, I don’t know that anyone could sit down and say someone confessed their murder will make our ratings go up. Well, you don’t need the phrase sit down. You just say, I don’t know that anyone could say someone confessed to murder and make our reigns go up.
So the question is, why did he use these extra words, sit down. Well, as you know, in reading the book, it turned out it was a hoax on their part. Uh, the caller was another DJ, I believe, from Arizona that called in. And most likely when the three of them got together to plan this, they were probably all sitting down talking about, is this gonna work?
Is it not gonna work? Mm-hmm. He can see, he can see them planning it. He can see them sitting there and it ends up coming into his [00:11:00] statement. Those extra words, uh, sit down.
Zach: Yeah, I really, I really like that one. It’s, it’s just such an interesting Yeah. You know, it’s, it’s the kind of thing that like a lot of, uh, these things that could pass by unnoticed if you weren’t paying a lot of attention and Right.
But then when you think about it, you’re like, that is a really weird way to phrase that, you know?
Mark: Yeah. So there, you know, and there were a few other indications of deception as well, the big ones where they didn’t answer that specific question. They’re not talking about themselves, they’re talking about you and I using the pronoun you.
Zach: One little one was when he said the second DJ ended it with, it’s pretty grim, really, you know, with that, the really modifier, uh, can you talk a little bit about how, how frequent those are and deceptive, uh, language?
Mark: Yeah. People like to use, uh, certain words to, to bolster their statement, but oftentimes it weakens the statement because again.
They’re, they’re not needed. Uh uh, the word really, it’s almost like saying truthfully, honestly. It’s like when people say, I swear to God, or honest to God, you know, I, I tell people it’s, it’s a 50 50 with [00:12:00] these, you know, half the time people have a habit of using some of these phrases and half the time, you know, they’re being deceptive.
But it’s something you definitely wanna take a look at and ask a few more questions about in an interview setting. You know, is this person trying to convince me they’re being truthful, or is this just part of their, uh, vernacular using some of these, uh, words and phrases?
Zach: And one other interesting thing was the amount of stutters and missteps in their speech, which I know you, uh, you know that in a similar way, the, those kinds of things aren’t usually that meaningful because some people just talk like that.
But in this case, these guys were radio DJs, which, you know, you would think they’d be, would be quite comfortable talking clearly and straightforwardly, so, right. All the little ums and stutters kind of are more likely to be meaningful. Right.
Mark: Yeah, that’s one. The few times we’d have to establish a baseline with statement analysis.
Does this person normally stutter? But as you pointed out, they’re professional speakers, they’re DJs, so I gotta believe they don’t stutter and, and so that stuttering, those pauses would both be indication that they’re under some stress. I.
Zach: Uh, [00:13:00] yeah, so that was an interesting one. I, I think it was just a good, a good example of a lot of different things in one place.
And it’s, it’s kinda like, um, you know, uh, like a lot of things, like for when you’re uncertain, when you, when you see a lot of signs of deception pointing the same way, I think it, you know, it helps make your confidence that there’s, there’s being, there’s some deception there better. Uh, and those, like you said, those guys were found out to have planned that, that, uh, radio hoax, um.
Any other recent examples in the, in the news that, uh, where you saw some or heard some, uh, interesting verbal or written behavior? Any, any recent current events?
Mark: Probably the most recent one is the, uh, the Chris Watts out in, uh, Colorado, who said, uh, that his wife and two. Children had disappeared. This was, uh, a few weeks ago and he, uh, I think he reported it was on Monday.
He reported three of them missing. On Tuesday, he gave an interview to local television [00:14:00] station. Then on Wednesday, he pled guilty to at least, uh, killing his wife. But a lot of people thought he gave a pretty good interview on that Tuesday. Uh, seemed like he was, uh. A grieving husband and father. But as I listened to his statements, uh, at one point he said, uh, I have no inclination of where they are right now.
And then later on he said, I have no idea like where they went. You very rarely can a person honestly say, I have no idea or no clue. When people use those phrases, they’re, they’re acting like they know absolutely nothing. And it’s just hard to believe ’cause most people have an opinion just about everything.
I mean, he may not know what happened to them. He may not know where they are, but he probably has somewhat of a clue. So when you hear those phrases, I have no idea. I have no clue that light bulb in your head should turn on. ’cause very rarely can a person honestly say that. And I, I see it happen all the time where that phrase is used and it turns out they’re being, uh, deceptive.
Zach: Yeah. It makes me think, uh, it makes me [00:15:00] think that you’re in your book there. I can definitely remember a, a good number of examples where people would feign, you know, complete cluelessness, you know?
Mark: Yeah. So it’s something to listen for. And then the other big one he had in his statement was, uh, he talked about his oldest daughter in the past tense.
He said Bella was going to start kindergarten next Monday. Now if he and you talking about people in the past, tense means it’s an indication that, you know, they’re no longer around, they’re deceased. Uh, if he felt his daughter was still alive, ’cause this is a Tuesday, he’s given a statement. He would say, you know, Bella is supposed to, or, or is going to start school next week or next Monday.
But he said was, and that’s a strong indication. He knows something that we don’t know. And it turned out that he, I think he claims now that his wife had killed his two daughters and then, and his angry killed his wife. I would love to see that statement. I haven’t, I don’t think they’ve released that yet.
Uh, most people believe he killed his entire family and then, uh, dispose of their [00:16:00] bodies, but there were strong several indications of deception in his statement. If you listen closely to what he was saying.
Zach: Yeah, I, I watched some of that last night. I, I think I might have watched a different one than you, but I, I made a couple notes that stood out to me and, uh, one thing he said was, um, when the interviewer basically said, uh.
Basically was like, well, one of the problems with this is, you know, people are saying you might have done something like this, and he is not angry at all and doesn’t, doesn’t deny it. He’s given a clear chance to say, I didn’t do this. But he said, he basically says every, everyone’s gonna have their own opinion on anything like this.
I just want people to know that I want my family back, I want them safe, I want them here. So he, you know, it, it was very similar actually to some things in your book with, uh, I think it was a Michael Jackson denial and the James Earl Ray denial, where they were basically saying, well, everybody’s gonna have their, their own opinion, you know, whereas like you would think an innocent person would be like, I just wanna let everybody know I had nothing to do with this.
You know? Uh, that was kind of interesting.
Mark: Yeah, no denial. You’re right. We expect him to deny it. And what we’re [00:17:00] looking for in a denial is to say, I didn’t do it. You know, I, I didn’t kill my family or I don’t know what happened to them. And, and he never, he doesn’t give a, a good denial, like you said, in fact.
Probably 99% of the things he said were true. You know, I want my family back. He probably does regret what he did and wants them back, you know? But as you point out, he, he never gave a, gave a good denial.
Zach: Mm-hmm. And one other thing I noticed that was kind of interesting was he says, twice, I want those kids back.
And he talks about those kids. He never says my kids or anything in the whole inter eight minute interview. So I thought that was kinda interesting too, like using the, the pronoun, the kind of analysis thing.
Mark: Yep. Yeah. Not using their names. Correct.
Zach: Okay, so we’ll, uh, we’ll move on. Maybe we’ll come back to another current event thing, uh, later.
But I wanted to move on to kind of some philosophical things about statement analysis. Uh, so one of the main concepts of statement analysis is that people don’t like to lie, so it pays to listen to them closely. [00:18:00] And, uh, you can break down these kinds of statements into. Uh, two main categories, the kinds of statements from, you know, interrogations and interviews and this kinds of, these kinds of things.
The two main categories to me are someone giving a history of things that occurred, like their, their version of events, their alibi, and then in the second category, they’re the actual denials of doing things like, I swear I didn’t set up that hoax, or I, I didn’t kill her. Things like that. So those can be very direct or in the case of guilty people often very indirect.
So I wanna talk about the first category a little bit. We, we can probably all understand that category because when guilty people give their version of events, there’s, there’re usually clues present because, you know, they’re afraid of slipping up. They don’t want to get caught in a lie. There’s a lot of mental load involved.
So they’re, you know, con uh, pretty frequently slipping up in those complicated storytelling, uh, you know. Endeavors, which kind of makes sense. You know, we’ve all tried to lie at some time and it’s takes a little [00:19:00] effort. Uh, the second category though, is more interesting to me because it’s the straightforward denials.
Uh, and you know, as you show in your work, there are many examples of people who don’t seem to be able to just come out and straight deny that they did something. You know, uh, they hedge and make ambiguous statements. They don’t just come out and say, I didn’t do it. And, uh, I, I just wondered if. If you’ve, over the years, have an idea for why it’s so hard for people, even people who have done horrible things, you know, murderers, why, why do they find it so hard to deny things in a straightforward manner?
Mark: Well, I think most people are raised that, you know, a lying is wrong. You should always tell the truth. So that factors into it. Uh, people know when they tell a lie, it causes stress. That stress can, uh, be manifested in the form of a body movement. And so, or even with a polygraph, it detects, you know, uh, a, uh, they’re perspiring more.
They have an increased heart rate. And so they’re afraid if they tell a lie that their body language may reveal the fact [00:20:00] that they’re lying. And then sometimes it’s hard to keep track of lies, you know, when it’s coming from the truth, when it’s the truth coming from memory. You can always recall what you just said, you know, previously ’cause it’s all there.
But when you’re telling a lie, you don’t have that memory to rely upon. And so they may forgot what they said just, you know, 10 minutes ago and they’re, they don’t want to contradict themselves. And then in like an interview setting, um, the subject doesn’t know what the interviewer knows and if, if the subject.
Tell us a lie, and the interviewer knows it’s a lie. Well then he just dug his grave, so to speak, a little bit deeper. So the safest way for people to play it, especially in an open statement. And by that I mean where they can say anything they want. You know, tell us what happened. Tell us what you did.
Very rarely will people lie. Now we’ll skip over Eric. They don’t wanna talk about, we can identify that. But this statement itself is probably a truthful statement. But even with, as you mentioned with direct answers, direct, uh, you know, specific questions. People still [00:21:00] sometimes won’t come out and say, I didn’t do it, or I didn’t hit her, or I didn’t take the money.
They won’t give a specific denial. They’ll just kind of, uh, allude to it and, and hoping you’ll believe they didn’t do it. And I think it’s because of some of those reasons that they just, um, don’t wanna lie. They know they could get caught in a lie. And so they, they just try to give, uh, the impression. Now, every once in a while somebody will tell, um, like in an open statement, will tell a lie, but then they’ll end up.
You know, softening the lie a little bit. Um, the, the DC sniper, John Al Muhammad, uh, represented himself in court, sent his opening statement to the jury. He told the jurors that the evidence will show that I had nothing to do with these crimes. Well, again, the best denial is to deny, deny, to deny the act itself.
The best denial would’ve been to tell the jury that owns a show. I didn’t do it, or I wasn’t a shooter. He just used a general phrase I had nothing to do with. Now, he was convicted of being a DC sniper, so he did do it. That’s a lie, but he [00:22:00] softens a lie. It’s hard for him to tell a direct lie even when his life is on the line, and it’s hard for him to say, you know, I didn’t do it.
So use the phrase I had nothing to do with.
Zach: Right. It’s just so, it is just so kind of mind boggling because you’d think if somebody was, you know, one had killed someone and was under a lot of stress already, that you would think those kinds of straight denials would be the easiest part of their, you know, uh, the, the things they’re doing.
You know, just saying like, I did not do this, but it, it just, it, it is just fascinating to me how. So many examples that it’s so hard to find those straightforward denials. You know, and, and your book, your books are, are full of those kinds of examples where people just, you know, hedge and yeah, it just, like you said, people are uncomfortable with lying, which, which makes sense.
But then you would think at some point your, your self, your, your survival instincts, uh, would, would kick in and you’d be like, okay, I’m just gonna make a. I’m just gonna straightforwardly lie, like what do I have to lose? So it’s just, it must really speak to how uncomfortable at some fundamental [00:23:00] emotional level people are with lying, I guess.
Mark: Yeah. And then even, you know, obviously every once in a while somebody will tell a direct lie and say, I didn’t do it, but their whole statement has to back that up. So they may tell, give a good denial, I didn’t do it. But then as you continue the interview, look at the rest of their statement, you’ll see other deceptive indicators.
Whereas with truthful people. You know, they’ll, there’ll usually be no deceptive indicators or maybe just one, and we would conclude that, you know, they are being truthful.
Zach: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Uh, and I, one other thing I, I was thinking when I was reading your book most recently was, uh, one of the factors might be a little bit of pride for some of the, uh, people who’ve done bad things.
You know, like Timothy McVey, uh, springs to mind because when I was reading his interview, transcriptions it, you know, he, he, it felt like he. Probably had some pride in what he did because it was a cause he was behind and so he didn’t want to fully deny that he did it. You know? Do you think that was a factor, at least for him?
Mark: And that could be, uh, you could be right on the money there that [00:24:00] he, like you said, he was proud of what he did and so he didn’t wanna come out and say, I didn’t do it. Uh, he was asked, you know, did you do it? And he didn’t say no.
Zach: Right. He had many, many opportunities
Mark: because. In a sense, he wants people to know that he’s responsible for it.
You know, that was the whole gist of that.
Zach: And, uh, getting back to those, uh, getting back to those really actually modifiers. Like when someone says, I didn’t do it, honest to God or whatever, uh, I know those are, you know, only slight modifiers and, and don’t always point to deception. But I was, I was wondering what if you had an opinion about what it was about those kinds of, uh, statements, uh, that make it.
That, that make a guilty person more likely to use them. You know, the, like, it seems, it seems like a trivial difference between saying I didn’t kill ’em and saying, honest to God I didn’t kill ’em. But the, you know, the guilty person’s more likely to throw in those, those modifiers. And I just wondered what [00:25:00] is it about those that kind of hedge their statement a little bit or make it safer for them to, to say that in their, in their minds.
Mark: Well, I think it’s because they know they did it and they want to tell you they didn’t do it. But because they know they did it, they feel like they gotta add more to their denial instead of just saying, I didn’t do it. As you point out, they may say, I swear to God, I didn’t do it. To try to convince you that they’re being truthful or, or as a truthful person will just say, I didn’t do it.
Now if you challenge them. You know, come on. You know, you were there and they’re being truthful. They sense that you don’t believe ’em. Well then that may cause them to later say, you know, I swear to God I didn’t do it. ’cause once they sense that you don’t believe them, maybe they feel like they have to add these words or phrases.
And that’s why I tell people, you know, it’s something to definitely look for. But it’s, you know, it’s 50 50 depending on which phrases we’re talking about and, and how they’re being used. Like with the word really, you know, the word really. Um. Indicates possible deception. But again, if we’re talking [00:26:00] about pain, we have different pain tolerances that hurts versus that really hurts.
Well that really hurts. It’s acceptable. It probably means it’s more painful than that hurts. But when a person says, you know, I really can’t pay any more than this. There’s a very good chance you probably could pay a little bit more.
Zach: Hmm. Yeah. One of my favorite, uh, se parts of your first book was you talked about, uh, OJ Simpson saying he was a hundred percent innocent in his, I think either in his book or as a, a statement.
And then later in his book, he says he bel he believed in, uh, Nicole’s ability as a mother 1000%. You know, so just the, the difference between the 100%. His own own innocence and that the thousand percent competency had in, in Nicole. I, I just thought that was a, a really interesting, uh, yeah, based
Mark: on that scale, he’s 900% guilty and only 100% percent.
Right. Yeah. I mean, you know, obviously numbers go on forever, so people have different scales and, and we don’t know what scale he was [00:27:00] using.
Zach: I think it’s, I think it’s interesting because it, it kind of shows maybe the value that some, some people see in those kind of modifiers because it’s kind of like watering down the, uh, the statement a little bit.
You know, it’s like even if you’re using like, you know, honest to God or whatever, it’s just kind of like throwing more, almost like an instinct to just throw more material into your. Into your denial to just like muddy the waters in some way. Like, ’cause there’s always, you know, like for example, somebody says, honest to God, like if they don’t believe in God, like maybe in their mind they’re not lying or something, you know, like just throwing in these extra.
Extra levels of meaning that could kind of detract from the straightforward denial, I don’t know.
Mark: Yep. That’s the kind, that’s the kind of word games that people play. You know, like he pointed out, if they don’t believe in God, then it’s easy for ’em to say honest to God. ’cause it doesn’t mean too much to them.
Zach: Yeah. I think it’s interesting how people, you know, instinctually find these solutions. You know, it’s not like I, I don’t think, correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t, I don’t think a lot of these people are like, actively in their [00:28:00] minds, you know, uh, thinking of, uh. Really good deceptive ways to speak. It’s, they’re just finding natural instinctual ways to avoid telling the truth.
So they find these indirect ways. Um, you know, I’m, I’m thinking it from the, from the, uh, DJ hoax. Video when, uh, you know, he, he speaks, they speak in very, uh, ambiguous and indirect ways and use different pronouns. But I don’t, I don’t think that’s, that’s not like, uh, a purposeful deceptive act on their part.
They’re probably kind of speaking a little bit off the cuff, but it, it’s a natural, it, it forms those deceptive, uh, patterns naturally for them just out of. Solving the problem of how to lie. Well,
Mark: right. I, I agree. They, they’re not purposely thinking, well, I’m gonna use the pronoun you. It’s just in their mind, it’s hard for ’em to say, you know, these are lines that I wouldn’t cross ’cause I did cross ’em.
So they unknowingly use the pronoun you, and that’s the key there. It’s unknowingly, you know, they’re speaking a certain way and that’s what allows us to, [00:29:00] to determine they’re being deceptive.
Zach: In, uh, in my poker book, verbal Poker Tales, I I, after looking at a lot of footage and taking a lot of notes, one of my big findings was, you know, similar to statement analysis, it was people do not poker, players don’t like to lie, uh, during a hand, you know, as long as there’s a potential for a hand, their hand is still be exposed.
Most poker players don’t like to tell lies. They may speak in indirect. You know, ambiguous language, sort of like we’ve been talking about, but they don’t like to just directly lie and say, you know, I have whatever. Um, I mean, one, one reason for that is, you know, they don’t want to be, uh, perceived as a liar, uh, by the people.
They’re, they’re nearby. But I think, uh, another. Another factor there that doesn’t really apply to real life situations is that in competitive situations like poker, you kind of assume that people are going to be lying to you. So it, uh, it, you know, it makes, it makes direct statements less likely to, so, uh, yeah.
Anyway, just I was, I just wanted to [00:30:00] make that, uh. Analogy to poker there, because I think a lot of, a lot of people assume that poker players are often lying during a hand, but as it turns out, you know, when someone tell, makes a direct statement in poker, you should actually listen to it because there’s usually, uh, a lot of truth there and you just need to figure out what they’re, what they’re actually telling you.
Uh, okay, so moving on, let’s talk about, uh, some applications. Of this, of this kind of, uh, work you do. Uh, let’s see. What, what are some of the main applications and jobs that, that you’ve worked on? I, I know that, I know that this kind of work is probably not likely to be admissible in court. Is that correct?
Mark: Well, actually a lot of techniques are admissible in court because they’re, they’re based on the English language. Um, now, like, like we just discussed, you know, saying, I, I swear to God, honest to God. Oh, he’s lying. That, that wouldn’t fly in court. But, but you know, pronouns, [00:31:00] um, are what they are. Um, you had, uh, David Westerfield out in, uh, San Diego, California years ago who, uh, was convicted of killing Danielle Van Dam.
He had kidnapped her on a Friday night and then. Left in his RV and he claimed he was driving, driving around the Southern California countryside for the weekend by himself. And then when he came back on Monday, he found the neighborhoods all up in arms ’cause Danielle is missing. So that’s when the police interviewed him.
But when they asked him about this, you know, excursion that he went on at one point he used the pronoun we
Zach: Oh, right, I heard this. Which,
Mark: which absolutely tells us that somebody else is with you. I mean it’s, we know we is a plural pronoun, but yet throughout this lengthy interview, he insisted he was by himself.
Mm-hmm. And so, uh, they eventually found her body and forensically, they could place her in his rv and linguistically we could place somebody in his rv. That being Danielle. Now they, the detectives picked up on that and confront him on his language. And at this point you’re hoping to get a confession. [00:32:00] Uh, but he didn’t confess.
I don’t know if that was used in court, but I see no reason why you couldn’t use that in court, that as long as everything was legitimate, as far as the interview goes, that he. Use the pronoun we, mm, that we are at this little place because, uh, that’s admissible. Everybody knows we is a plural pronoun, yet he was insisting he was by himself.
And then like with Verb Tenses, you had the, uh, again, out in San Diego, uh, I think it was in 2010, the, uh, McStay family disappeared. Joseph McStay and his wife and two kids, their car was found near the Mexican border. Speculation. They’d walked in the Mexico and, and didn’t come back. Well, a couple days after they reported missing, the police interviewed, uh, Joseph McStay business partner, uh, Charles Merritt, and Merrit told the police, uh, Joseph was my best friend.
I. Well, he used the past tense woods. It should be, Joseph is my best friend. We gotta find him. Well, eventually, several years later, they found their bodies in in some shallow [00:33:00] graves, and they charged merit with their murders. And it still hasn’t gone to trial yet. I. But in their affidavit for his arrest warrant, they used the fact that he talked about their family members in the past tense prior to them, their bodies being discovered.
Oh, interesting. ’cause again, that’s a strong indication that he knows something that we don’t know. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And so, yeah, there are some applications where it can be used in legal proceedings or in the courtroom. Unfortunately, even with prosecutors or even defense attorneys, uh, it just goes unnoticed.
Um, when a, a witness testifies a certain way.
Zach: Mm-hmm. Are you ever called to be an expert in court cases?
Mark: I, I get that question asked a lot, and I usually talk myself out of it because again, I tell them, you don’t need me as an expert to testify that when a person said, uh, well, I, I tried to be truthful, which is what Bill Clinton said, uh, the word tried means I didn’t do it.
Mm-hmm. Hey, I attempted but failed. Uh. You don’t need an expert to testify that you need me there to point out what he’s saying, which is how I help, uh, attorneys and, and [00:34:00] investigators. But, you know, I can’t testify to, like I said, if somebody says, I swear to God, that means they’re being deceptive ’cause that’s not gonna fly.
But since the rest of it’s, I. Most of it’s based on the English language. You just need me there to point out what the person is saying. So I only was asked to testify one time and I, I showed up, but then eventually there was a, a plea agreement was reached. It was, it was a case of he said, she said. But like I said, most of the time you don’t need an expert to, to testify.
And it can, again, I’ve seen it used in the courtroom, but it’s the attorneys have to pick up on the language.
Zach: Yeah. It seems like you’d be really valuable to just be in the courtroom listening to, you know, witnesses as they talk about things and, you know, giving your notes to the, to the lawyers. I, I would just think that would be really valuable, you know?
Uh. At the very least, uh, you know, just, just cover bases of maybe, we’ll, maybe we’ll see. Interesting things to ask. You know, down the, down the line, what other, what [00:35:00] other things do you work on? I know you do some live training. Uh, what are your, what are your, what is your schedule like these days for statement analysis related things?
Mark: I usually go out about every other month for a couple weeks and conduct, uh, three or four seminars just traveling around the country. There are one day seminars. Most of them are open seminars. Anybody can attend. Uh, obviously with my background, most of my audience is law enforcement, but I, I get human resources personnel that will attend, uh, loss prevention officers, private investigators, anybody who does interviews obviously would benefit from the training.
So that keeps me pretty busy conducting the, uh, the seminars. And then I, I have investigators send me statements, uh, to look at and, and give them. My opinion, is this guy being truthful or is he being deceptive? And I try to provide errors if I, if I think they are being deceptive. These are certain areas you should ask about.
I think this is where he is withholding information. [00:36:00]
Zach: Yeah, I would think, uh, I would think for law enforcement, I mean, I, I would hope that they value your kind of training much more than they would value, like nonverbal behavioral or physical behavior stuff. I, I would just think my opinion would be that, you know, verbal analysis would be so much more productive and than, uh, studying.
Behavioral, uh, physical behavior. Do, do you think that’s the case? Do you think that’s generally more respected? Um, the, the, the statement analysis,
Mark: well, the body language, the nonverbal has been around for a long time and so there’s lots of people who, who teach, uh, nonverbal communication and there’s a lot to be gained from that.
Uh, linguistic analysis. There’s not as many people, uh, teaching that, but, and so, but what I tell people is, um, you should focus on the language. I mean, pick up on any obvious nonverbal gestures a person may display, you know, at some point in the interview, they, they cross their arms, they lean back in their chair.
While that’s an indication, [00:37:00] they’re a little closed off, maybe trying to get away from you, but don’t focus on the non verbs. If you’re watching their hands and their eyes, which way are they looking? I. You’re probably not listening to what they’re saying, right? And everything you need to know is gonna be in that statement.
Right now, I tell people, now, sometimes people ask me, what if a body language says one thing and the language says something else? And I say, well, you go with the language. But what you’ll find, I. Is that they won’t contradict each other. I mean, I’ve seen cases where people said, well, his body language says he is lying, but the language says he is telling the truth.
And I say, no, the language indicates he’s lying as well if you listen to what he’s saying. So usually they’ll match up. I mean, if the guy’s being deceptive, it’s gonna pop up several different ways throughout his statement and probably several different ways throughout his, uh, nonverbal gestures.
Zach: Mm-hmm.
Yeah, I, I would just think this, this kind of knowledge would be so helpful for, for, uh, you know, people doing interrogations and I would just hope that. A lot of, a lot of police would, would get this kind of training. It just, you know, it just makes them [00:38:00] better listeners and, you know, they’ll, they’ll miss less, less clues, you know, and yeah, I just, I just hope more people are, uh, more law enforcement, get this training.
I, I think it’s important.
Mark: Yeah. One of the biggest comments I get, you know, when I’m done giving a seminar is that, you know, as people are leaving, they tell me, I wish I had this, you know, 20 years ago.
Zach: Mm-hmm.
Mark: You know, and I was the same way when I was out in the field. I wish, uh, yeah, I knew this too. It just, it just does, makes you a better interviewer,
Zach: right?
I mean, yeah, for example, like, I was just watching that Chris Watts video, and if I hadn’t been paying attention, like I was specifically paying attention because I was gonna be interviewing you today. But if I, if I had just let it kind of, you know, flow over me and not listen to it carefully, it would’ve just, those things would’ve just passed by without, without comment.
And I think it’s just a good example of, you know, uh. You gotta be, you gotta be tuned in for. For, uh, serious things that pays to be tuned in.
Mark: And that’s what I tell people when, when you’re in an interview setting, you have to turn it on. Mm-hmm. You listen [00:39:00] to every word that person says when you’re with a friend, a colleague having a conversation.
I mean, we’re, we participate in a conversation, but we’re not hinged on every word they say. We’re thinking about, what am I gonna have for lunch today? You know, what am I doing this weekend? Mm-hmm. In an interview setting. No, you gotta focus on. Everything that person tells you. ’cause sometimes it’s only one word that gives it away, but fortunately, if they’re being deceptive, it’s gonna pop up some different ways, uh, throughout their statement.
Zach: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Getting, getting back to that per personal, uh, social aspects. You had talked a little bit in your first book about how, uh, you know, being, being, uh, perceptive about these kinds of things can rub your, uh, you know, friends and family members the wrong way that ’cause you’re, you’re analyzing their statements and using that to.
Make decisions, uh, have you learned to kind of turn that off in your, uh, in your day-to-day life? Outside of, outside of work?
Mark: Yeah. That’s what you do. Like I said, you don’t hinge on every word a person’s saying when you’re just talking to a friend, but as I tell them in my seminars, I’m gonna give you some things that [00:40:00] you’ll never forget.
And even if you’re talking to a colleague, they may use a certain word and that light bulb in your head suddenly goes off. Well, well, how do you handle that? Well, again, we realize that sometimes there are indications of deception. That’s why we’re looking for several indications and it, and with a suspect.
You’ll probably get those several indications if they’re being deceptive with a friend. It may just be one word and that’s it. Nothing else indicates deception. Mm-hmm. In an interview setting, you’re gonna ask follow-up questions to determine are they being truthful or deceptive? Are they, you know, skipping over something here, you’re talking to a friend, you’re not gonna ask follow-up questions.
Zach: Yeah. Hopefully not.
Mark: No. So it’s just, it goes, it goes in one ear and out the other. In a situation like that, that’s one way you can kind of handle that.
Zach: Right. I, I feel like there’s a natural, you know, there’s a natural tendency to not use that stuff with, in social situations, even if you have that ability.
It just, it’s kind of a politeness factor. Like you don’t, it’s the same reason you don’t like spy on people when they’re talking. You know, you just, you don’t, you don’t want to do that to people in, in social situations. [00:41:00] Even if you were able to listen and parse their. Conversation, uh, that, that’s how I feel anyway.
It’s like I kind, you kind of wanna turn that off and be polite.
Mark: Ab Absolutely. Or else nobody would talk to you once they think you’re doing
Zach: right. Actually, my first, uh, interview that I did on this podcast, you’re the second person I’ve talked to, but the first, uh. Person I interviewed was a comedian talking about how he used, uh, you know, uh, parsing language and, and body language.
And he talked about how he could tell when friends were, you know, bored or bothered by something he was saying. And he would like, he had learned to not reference that stuff because it bothered them so much that he would like be parsing their, their language and what they were feeling during, uh, you know, his, during him talking.
So I thought that was an interesting tie in there.
Mark: Oh yeah. When, uh, if I meet somebody for the first time and we’re just having a conversation, they ask me what I do. You know, I tell ’em, you know, I’m a retired US marshal, but I tell them that I conduct, uh, [00:42:00] training on interviewing techniques, but I don’t say, I conduct training on how to tell somebody’s lying because again, all of a sudden people’s guards suddenly go up.
Right. You know, so I just label as interviewing techniques, which is true. That’s what we’re doing. Uhhuh.
Zach: Yeah, you, yeah. Sets, sets them on guard for sure, I’m sure. Uh, so, uh, do you feel, have you feel your, uh, skills at this have progressed over the years? Do you feel like you maxed out or near maxed out in skills somewhere along the line?
Or has it been a continual progression of improvement, would you say?
Mark: Yeah, it’s a continual progression of improvement. Um, when I first. Took several courses in linguistic analysis. It was eye-opening for me. I learned a lot. And then over the years doing my own studies, discovered more, uh, deceptive language that people like to use.
And, and I su suspect 10 years from now there’ll be, you know, some more, uh, words or phrases that will, will pop up. And so it’s, it’s a continual thing. I mean, I’m. When I first got into law form, [00:43:00] it was probably like, like most people, not the best listener, um, but by, you know, doing the training, teaching a lot of people, doing the studies, it it gets, it gets me to be a better listener now when I’m doing an interview or watching an interview, you know, on television.
Zach: Do you feel it’s something you were naturally good at before, uh, I guess you already answered that you were, you were average at it?
Mark: Yeah. No, I, I don’t think, uh, I mean’s obviously some people are better listeners than others. I. But I don’t think in terms of picking up on exactly what a person’s telling you, I mean, it’s more, I think of an acquired trait.
Once you’re told, listen for this, then you start to realize, yeah, that does show up a lot in, in deceptive statements.
Zach: Mm-hmm. Okay. Uh, I guess we have a little bit more time than I thought. Uh, if you’re okay for time, uh, we can talk about maybe another current event thing that pops in your mind. Uh, did you have anything else?
Mark: Um, the one that’s been in the news off and on. Uh, Steven Avery. [00:44:00]
Zach: Mm-hmm.
Mark: In 2015, Netflix released their documentary, uh, making a Murder. And Steven, uh, it had to do with, uh, Theresa Halach up in Wisconsin. She was a photographer for the Autotrader Magazine was last seen at the Avery’s auto salvage yard.
Talking to Steven Avery. She was there to take a picture of, uh, I believe it was a minivan that they were gonna sell through the magazine. She had been there other times taking pictures of other cars that they sold through the magazine and Netflix. Avery was convicted of her murder, uh, and sent to prison, but some people felt that the police framed him, and that’s because in 1985, he was wrongfully convicted of a sexual assault case spent, I think it was 18 years in prison before DNA exonerated him.
Mm-hmm. So he got a bad rap and he was suing the county. And I think that’s why some people felt that, well, maybe the police framed him. ’cause now he’s suing the county for mis imprisonment or whatever the title might [00:45:00] be for that. And the documentary by Netflix leans in that direction. I. Well, a couple days after Halach disappeared, a reporter interviewed Steven Avery and the reporter asked Steven Avery, did she mention any, any other appointments that day or anything like that, you know, trying to track, uh, halach, uh, whereabouts, and Avery replied, I don’t think so.
’cause most of the time she takes a picture, then she writes down the serial number, then she comes and collects the money, and that’s about it. And again, that’s a truthful statement. But the key words is, he said, I don’t think so, because most of the time, Hmm. And he is right. Most of the time that she was there.
That’s exactly what she did. But he couldn’t say that. She took a picture, wrote down the serial number, you know, collected the money, and, and left because she never left those premises. Hmm. And they had found. I think her car keys and his trailer, which sits on the property, they found her cell phone and a burn barrel next to his trailer.
They found parts of her bones and a burn pit [00:46:00] behind his trailer, and that’s why he was convicted. But again, a good reporter, a good interview would realize, well, you just told me what she did most of the time. Mm-hmm. Of course. I’m asking you, what did she just do, you know, two nights ago? Mm-hmm. When, when you, when she was at your, uh, at your, uh, business.
Mm-hmm. And so that’s that to me, as soon as I heard that was a big red flag that, uh, no, he had something to do with her disappearance. I mean, no doubt in my mind, based on other statements that he, uh, had killed Theresa Halach.
Zach: Yeah. That was, uh, surprising how many people seemed to assume that he was innocent from watching that documentary, because I know the documentary didn’t include a lot of incriminating things.
I’ve, I’ve read the list of incriminating things that they didn’t include, and I, I was really surprised by how many people were. Basically, you know, um, completely took the side of Avery for that, for that second crime, for that murder. Uh, when, to me, even watching the documentary, I was, I had a lot of questions.
I was like, this, uh, you could, you could simultaneously see that he didn’t commit the [00:47:00] first crime and yet find it probable that he committed the murder. Uh, and that was before I even realized all the information that they left out of the documentary, which was a lot of incriminating stuff. So, uh. Yeah. So that’s a, that’s an interesting one.
Have to look for that interview. I hadn’t, I hadn’t seen that. Uh, I’d like to see an interview of him about that.
Mark: And I think they were working on a, a second documentary, but I haven’t seen if that’s out yet or not. Hmm.
Zach: Okay. Uh, so if people were interested in, uh, learning more about your work, reading your work, what would you recommend them to do?
Where would they go?
Mark: Uh, I go to my website, it’s statement analysis.com. And, um, you had mentioned, you know, the two books I’d written. They’re, they’re available through my website as well as amazon.com. Uh, I know you’re aligned and, and don’t be deceived. If you go to my website, uh, you’ll see I have some on demand training.
It’s the same information I share in my one day seminars. And so you can also look at my seminars page, see where I’ll be if I’m gonna be in, [00:48:00] in your, in your area. But if not, you can take the on demand training and it’s, uh, it’s equivalent to seven to eight hours of training. Uh, certificate of completion when you, you complete it, there are some, a short quiz at the end of each lesson.
You know, it’s an open book test, uh, but to make sure people just don’t whiz through it. And then at the end, there’s a final test statement. People analyze. I have them send me their analysis and I give ’em some feedback on, on how well they’re doing. I also have a famous cases page on my website. Anything I see in the news of national interest, if I can get ahold of a transcript, I’ll analyze it and, and post my analysis of that case.
Uh, there’s probably over 40 cases on there right now, and so it’s a good way to, to pick up on some additional techniques, uh, that might not be in the books. ’cause anything I see in those statements, I will put it on the website there. So a lot, a lot of people find that interesting reading those, uh, case analysis.
Zach: Right? Yeah. I’ll have to check that out. I, I had missed that, that [00:49:00] section. Uh, yeah, that sounds great. Any, any other plans for, uh, other books in the works or any other big projects?
Mark: Uh, no other books. I think the two books pretty much, uh, sum it up. Uh. Writing a book is hard. You gotta be very detailed. I mean, speaking is a lot easier.
I think I’d rather speak for a week than, than, than write another book. Um, but I, yeah, I’m
Zach: kind of, I’m burning, I’m burning on the books myself.
Mark: Yeah. You know how it is. Uh, but I plan to put some, uh, YouTube videos out, perhaps, uh, series on, uh, statement analysis, just very short videos, things to look for in a statement, some of the things we talked about, and some additional techniques as well.
I’m hoping to do that in the near future.
Zach: Gotcha. Okay. Well thanks a lot for coming on, mark. It was great and educational to talk to you and, uh, it’s, this has been Mark ish, everyone, and that’ll do it. Thanks.